Town Council Mtg Smry 09/16/09

The live reporting for the Town Council meeting on Wednesday Sep 16, 2009 are collected here:

• Live reporting - closing items
• Live reporting - Administrator's report
• Live reporting - legislation
• Live reporting - Charter changes
• Live reporting - Town Council - 9/16/09  

Secretary of Elder Affairs - visits Senior Center Thursday, Sep 17

Meet the Newly Appointed
Secretary of Elder Affairs,
Ann Hartstein

at
the Franklin Senior Center
On
Thursday, Sept. 17
At 12:30 p.m.

The public is welcome to attend to ask questions
and offer feedback
about elder issues!

Originally posted on the Town website (doc)

Live reporting - closing items

L. OLD BUSINESS - none

M. NEW BUSINESS - none

N. COUNCIL COMMENTS
McGann - went to an Eagle Scout ceremony for three scouts at the Elks

What is the duty.legal option for dealing with a coyote. He has a number of coyotes coming up to his door, he doesn't want to loose his golden retriever to a coyote.

Doak - omitted from earlier report on the Charter Commission, did not look at the people currently in the position

Pfeffer - New Secretary of Elder Affairs will be at the Senior Center Thursday.

motion to adjourn - passed 8-0

Live reporting - Administrator's report

K. TOWN ADMINISTRATOR’S REPORT


Thanks to everyone's patience, the roads that were to be paved, have now been, some stripping remains.


The first newsletter has been sent out via email. You can sign up at the Town Administrators web page.


Live cable show available for on-demand viewing on the H1N1 virus update.

Live reporting - legislation

J. LEGISLATION FOR ACTION

1. Resolution 09-59: Amendment of FY 2010 Budget  motion to accept - passed  8-0
2. Resolution 09-60 Endorsement of the Municipal Affordable Housing Trust  motion to accept - passed  8-0
3. Bylaw Amendment 09-634: Amendment to the Franklin Conservation Bylaw Chapter 181-8D: Term of Years- 1st Reading  motion to accept - passed  8-0
4. Bylaw Amendment 09-635: Amendment to the Code of the Town of Franklin, Chapter 25 – Personnel Regulations – 1st Reading  motion to move to second reading - passed  8-0
5. Bylaw Amendment 09-636: Amendment to the Code of the Town of Franklin, Chapter 25 – Human Resource Management – 1st Reading motion to move to second reading - passed  8-0
6. Zoning Bylaw Amendment 09-637: Amendment to Chapter 185-3. Definitions – Referral to Planning Board  motion to refer, passed 8-0
   
7. Zoning Bylaw Amendment 09-638: Amendment to Chapter 185-39. Uses Accessory to Dwelling – Referral to Planning Board  motion to refer, passed 8-0

Notes for above
1 - balancing the budget with some minor adjustments now that the State budget numbers settled. This is a known adjustment, expected since the original budget was passed in June. About 1.4 million dollars was saved with salary deferments and co-pay adjustments.

2 - resolution added related to dissolving the Housing Partnership, the town would use the money to buy some housing and mark them for affordable housing forever.Looking to obtain smaller homes with this approach.

3 - A problem with consistency between the state level requirement and the local bylaw. This will provide some extensions one year at a time to bring the two into alingment.

4 - goes hand in hand with #5, the existing bylaw for personnel would be removed and replaced by a new bylaw to cover Human Resource issues. The Town Council would still be involved for approval as requried for the check and balence but to streamline the process for approvals to changes.
The one significant change is in the time off policy where it would provide more flexibility to the employee to use time but more responsibility and accountability.

Very few municipal governments do this, so they tried to account for the long term employees and still make it workable for the new employees. It is competitive.

Questions to clarify how this would be used, some of the questions are more to the day-to-day management of the personnel rather than the overall procedures being proposed. There are transition coverage items to help the existing employees move from the old way to the new way.

Suggestion to correct the document for the next reading to reflect the proper wording around the 30 days as discussed earlier.

6 and 7 go hand in hand, these had come before the Town Council previously, have been revised and are now being looked for to go to the Planning Board for further hearings and approval before coming back to the Town Council for final approval.

Discussion on need for "fulltime" in the definition, Per M Cerel, the text needs to be as tight as possible to put the onus on the resident to make the proof rather than the town having the burden of proof.

The resolution that was added reads as follows:

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

Live reporting - Charter changes

Subcommittee - Doak, Whalen, Zollo

the page of changes to be added later, there are a number of minor changes to reflect better language
One change would remove from the Charter the requirement for the Town Council to meet twice a month and change it to meeting once a month. The Town Council should have the ability via other Town Council procedures to hold meetings.

cleaning up conflicts within the charter and to remove ambiguities

Change of the Finance Committee from 11 to 9, and change the term to 2 (from 1).

Section 7-7 - to be removed, these items should really be covered in a human resources section.

The three page handout from the subcommittee follows:

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

--- page 2 ---

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

--- page 3 ---

Discover Simple, Private Sharing at Drop.io

Live reporting - Town Council - 9/16/09

Attending: Whalen, Vallee, Bartlett, Feeley, Pfeffer, Doak, McGann, Zollo
Missing: Mason

A. APPROVAL OF MINUTES – August 19, 2009, September 2, 2009
motion to approve - passed 8-0

B. ANNOUNCEMENTS
Harvest Festival this Sunday, 9/20/09  11:00 AM to 4:00 PM


C. PROCLAMATIONS/RECOGNITIONS - none

D. CITIZEN COMMENTS - none

E. APPOINTMENTS  - none

F. HEARINGS   - none

G. LICENSE TRANSACTIONS  - none

H. DISCUSSIONS - none

Open offer to candidates for Franklin's Election - November 3rd

As there are several new candidates for election this November, let me re-post my offer.

To the candidates for Franklin's election on November 3, 2009:

I extend an offer to conduct and post an interview with you here. The interview can be either text or audio.

You are running to conduct business on behalf of Franklin. Together, we can share your views, your objectives, and help to spread the word to create an informed voter.

Send me an email (shersteve at gmail dot com) and we can arrange a mutually convenient time.

Be aware that this is my public service effort conducted solely to create an informed electorate here in Franklin.

I do this for fun and education. If it stops being that way, I will stop. This is not an advertising site. This is an information sharing site.

My disclosure statement can be found here.

The Milford Daily News covers the current candidate line up in their article today.

November Election Line up

The line up for the November 3rd election finally has settled and looks like this:


Board of Assessors - 1 Position (For 4 years)
no candidates

updated 10/28/09

Chris Feeley has announced his intention to run as a "write-in" candidate for the Board of Assessors


Board of Health - 1 Position (For 4 years)
Bruce Hunchard
Koren Kanadanian - new

Planning Board - 2 Position (For 4 years)
Anthony Padula
Joseph Halligan - new

Planning Board (Associate) - 1 vacant position (For 4 Years)
John Carroll - new

Town Council - 9 Positions (For 2 Years)
Joseph McGann
R. Scott Mason
Judith Pond Pfeffer
Shannon Zollo
Robert Vallee
Stephen Whalen
Glenn Jones - new
Daniel Ballinger - new
Bryce Kuchs - new - due to changes at his work, he would be unable to fulfill the duties if elected*

Robert Avakian (switch from Board of Assessors)
Matthew Kelly (switch from School Committee)
Tina Powderly - new
Glenna Richards - new

School Committee - 7 Positions (For 2 Years)
Susan Rohrbach
Paula Mullen
Edward Cafasso
Roberta Trahan
Jeffrey Roy
William Glynn - new
Cynthia Douglas - new

* Kuchs name will still appear on the ballot as it has already been printed.

Third Thursday - 9/17/09

Yes, Third Thursday has rolled around for September already. Here are the details for the events scheduled to occur this Thursday evening in downtown Franklin:

Thursday, September 17 4:30 PM - 8:00 PM

hosted by Artbeat, The Creativity Store
 

Turning Sibling Rivalry into Harmony

Meet identical twin sisters (and Bellingham residents) Heather Kempskie and Lisa Hanson this Thursday, September 17th at ARTBEAT from 4:30 to 6:00 PM when we feature their award-winning "The Siblings' Busy Book: 200 Fun Activities for Kids of Different Ages."   Heather and Lisa will share tips with parents, and kids will have the chance to try some fun activities that help turn sibling rivalry into harmony.


Theme:  It's All About Time

Emma's Quilt Cupboard, It's Time to get started on your Holiday Gifts.  Come see our beautiful fall/holiday samples and take advantage of our new class offerings

Jane's Frames, 11 E. Central St. It's Time for Celebrating 15 years in business. Daily specials with lots of 15% off savings!

 H & R Block, 9 E. Central St. It's Time for Tax Planning! Tax talks every 15 minutes. Topics: education, making work pay credit, first time home buyers credit, home energy credits

Hair at Nail It, 20 Main St. Free wash & blow dry & new customer coupon

Franklin Pizza,  18 Cottage Street, Free 2 liter soda with large pizza purchase

Pretty is Pink, 9 Summer Street, It's Time for You. Shop for yourself, enter free drawing for Gift Certificate

Rick's Restaurant  28 W. Central St., It's Time for Taste, 3rd Thursday participants: Diners enjoy free homemade onion rings.

Sarapaan,  17 E. Central St , It's Time for a new look! Design your earrings and let us finish it for you.

Salon Sorella, 9 Summer St. It's Time to relax! Receive a free 10 minute back massage.

Get full details at each participating business

So much is happening Downtown/Uptown Franklin
Come join the Fun!

 

You can also mark your calendar for October 15th and November 19th for the next Third Thursdays!

Boston Globe introduces "Budget Blues", a new blog

Sent to you by Steve Sherlock via Google Reader:

Introducing Budget Blues, a new blog

via Override Central on 9/15/09

We're launching a new blog, Budget Blues, to cover the financial struggles facing Massachusetts communities and their tax payers. We'll write about property tax overrides, budget cuts and some of the spending priorities cities and towns make.

Things you can do from here:

• Subscribe to Override Central using Google Reader
• Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites

College Cost webinar - Thu Sep 17 - 7:00 PM

The word "college" can trigger a lot of stress, but here's a solution...

One of the country's leading experts in college admissions and financial aid, author and speaker Paul Hemphill, will be conducting a live seminar online Thursday evening, Sept 17, at 7 PM. Topics will include:

• How to cut $42,000 from college costs without a parent taking out a single loan
• The financial advantages to applying to 10 colleges instead of 5
• Why a student should apply Early Action and NOT Early Decision
• The 4 questions to ask to get the most financial aid
• The money advantage of appealing a financial aid award
• The financial advantages of going to college during high school
• The college application – why answers to innocent questions can cause rejections
• Financial aid forms – why you must be cautious

Paul provides 60-70 minutes of pure stress relief. Be sure your high school student is watching - Paul will set their minds - and yours - at ease.

Paul has a fact-filled and fast-paced program that will produce a few laughs from true stories that will really hit home.

Go ahead and register now, and be sure to send this notice of the webinar to 4 of your friends who have high school students.

Here's a free YouTube video Paul created, which has become the second most-watched video on college essays: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ago6tIEnL0g


Click through to register here

Open Learning Initiative - Great Courses

Sent to you by Steve Sherlock via Google Reader:

Open Learning Initiative - Great Courses

via Free Technology for Teachers by noreply@blogger.com (Mr. Byrne) on 9/11/09

The Open Learning Initiative offers free high-quality courses created by Carnegie Mellon University. There are courses available in Statistics, Engineering, Science, Economics, French, and more. All of the courses are open to anyone that wants to give the courses a try. Users can create an account to track their progress or users can just jump into the course materials without creating an account.

In addition to offering open learning opportunities to students, the Open Learning Initiative provides instructors with course packages that they can use for free. To explore the free options offered to educators, request an OLI Instructor Account.

Applications for Education
The Open Learning Initiative provides high school students with the opportunity explore their interests and get a sense of what is required by collegiate level courses. If you're school allows you to create independent study opportunities, the OLI instructor resources could be starting place for creating those opportunities.



Here are some related items that may be of interest to you:
100 Awesome Open Courses
Lectures and Courses from Great Universities
Yale Open Courses Added to iTunes

Things you can do from here:

• Subscribe to Free Technology for Teachers using Google Reader
• Get started using Google Reader to easily keep up with all your favorite sites

Who Gets the Money? Your Vote Decides for Dean Bank!

Who Gets the Money? Your Vote Decides!
 
Dean Bank will be hosting a fundraiser and would like you to help choose which Franklin-based non-profit organization will be the beneficiary.

On Saturday, October 10th, Dean Bank will host an E-Waste Recycling Collection behind its Main Office in Franklin. Local residents will be able to pay reasonable fees to drop off their old, used and unwanted electronics, which will be hauled away to a recycling facility. All profits will be donated to the Franklin-based non-profit that the community selects by voting at Dean Bank's website.

Dean Bank employees collectively nominated the following five organizations to be voted on: The Franklin Food Pantry, The Franklin Library, The Franklin Downtown Partnership, The Franklin 2010 July 4th Celebration, and Random Smile Project.

Tell us. . . Who do you support? The voting period will end on Monday, September 21st at 4:00pm. The organization that receives the most votes will be announced by Dean Bank as the fundraiser beneficiary. Voting is limited to one per computer. 

 
To VOTE on who you think should get the money and see current results, click HERE!
To LEARN MORE about the E-Waste Recycling Collection fundraiser, click HERE!

Town Council - Agenda - 9/16/09

A. APPROVAL OF MINUTES – August 19, 2009, September 2, 2009

B. ANNOUNCEMENTS

C. PROCLAMATIONS/RECOGNITIONS

D. CITIZEN COMMENTS

E. APPOINTMENTS

F. HEARINGS  

G. LICENSE TRANSACTIONS

H. DISCUSSIONS

I. SUBCOMMITTEE REPORTS – Charter Review Subcommittee

J. LEGISLATION FOR ACTION

1. Resolution 09-59: Amendment of FY 2010 Budget
2. Bylaw Amendment 09-634: Amendment to the Franklin Conservation Bylaw Chapter 181-8D: Term of Years- 1st Reading
3. Bylaw Amendment 09-635: Amendment to the Code of the Town of Franklin, Chapter 25 – Personnel Regulations – 1st Reading
4. Bylaw Amendment 09-636: Amendment to the Code of the Town of Franklin, Chapter 25 – Human Resource Management – 1st Reading
5. Zoning Bylaw Amendment 09-637: Amendment to Chapter 185-3. Definitions – Referral to Planning Board
6. Zoning Bylaw Amendment 09-638: Amendment to Chapter 185-39. Uses Accessory to Dwelling – Referral to Planning Board

K. TOWN ADMINISTRATOR’S REPORT

L. OLD BUSINESS

M. NEW BUSINESS

N. COUNCIL COMMENTS

O. EXECUTIVE SESSION – Negotiations, Litigation, Real Property, as May Be Required

P. ADJOURN

The documents supporting the pertinent agenda items can be found on the Town website here (PDF)

School Committee duties

With some potential new members coming to the School Committee, I thought it would be a good idea to find out what the School Committee duties are. The following comes from the School Committee policy library.

-----------
Policy BBAA

SCHOOL COMMITTEE MEMBER AUTHORITY

Authority

Because all powers of the Franklin School Committee derived from state laws are granted in terms of action as a group, members of the School Committee have authority only when acting as a committee legally in session.

The School Committee will not be bound in any way by any statement or action on the part of an individual member except when such statement or action is a result of specific instructions of the committee.

No member of the committee, by virtue of his/her office, will exercise any administrative responsibility with respect to the schools or command the services of any school employee.

The School Committee will function as a body and all policy decisions and other matters, as required by law, will be settled by an official vote of the committee sitting on formal session.

Duties

The duties and obligations of the individual committee member may be enumerated as follows:

1. To become familiar with the General Laws of the Commonwealth relating to educational and School Committee operations, regulations of the Massachusetts Board of Education, policies and procedures of this School Committee and the school department.

2. To keep abreast of new laws and the latest trends in education.

3. To have general knowledge of the goals, objectives, and programs of the town's public schools.

4. To work harmoniously with other committee members without trying either to dominate the committee or neglect his/her share of work.

5. To respect the privileged communication that exists in executive sessions by maintaining strict confidentiality on matters discussed in these sessions, except that which becomes part of the public record, once it has been approved for release.

6. To vote and act in committee impartially in the best interest of the students of the town of Franklin.

7. To accept the will of the majority vote in all cases, and to remember that he/she is one of a team and must abide by, and carry out, all committee decisions once they are made.

8. To represent the committee and the schools to the public in a way that promotes interest and support.

9. To refer questions and complaints to the proper school authorities.

10. To comply with the accepted code of ethics for School Committee members.

This policy statement can be found online with all the School Committee policies here

Secretary of Elder Affairs - visits Senior Center Thursday, Sep 17

Meet the Newly Appointed
Secretary of Elder Affairs,
Ann Hartstein

at
the Franklin Senior Center
On
Thursday, Sept. 17
At 12:30 p.m.

The public is welcome to attend to ask questions
and offer feedback
about elder issues!

Originally posted on the Town website (doc)

In the News - high school, exercise

Renovation allows student to attend Franklin High

from The Milford Daily News News RSS by Angel Roy/Daily News staff

-----

Franklin men, 90, push to keep fit

from The Milford Daily News News RSS by Angel Roy/Daily News staff