1987-Annual Report - Laserfiche WebLink

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Board of Selectmen Discussing School Budget at Town Meeting. recreation (playing fields at Lincoln Street) and for conservation (Tower Park addition). These changes, in turn, necessitated offsetting reductions in the stabilization fund, in infrastructure outlays and in free cash. With charges from the MWRA for water and sewage services rising rapidly, primarily to finance the clean -up of Boston harbor, the selectmen and town meeting voted to create enterprise funds for these services and to underwrite the costs increasingly through user fees. Management of Selectmen's Responsibilities. As suggested elsewhere in this report, each selectman has taken on many responsibilities beyond obvious board duties. In addition to those liaison activi- ties noted, Selectmen Eddison has been working with the Lexington council for the arts, North Lexington traffic committee and Hanscom - related groups. Selectman Marshall has kept abreast of an array of housing boards and committees; Selectmen William Dailey has been serving on the Cary Library execu- tive board, the classification review board and the police manual policy committee. Selectman Smith, also a Cary Library Executive Committee member, has been communicator with the planning board and trans- portation advisory committee. Selectman Leo McSweeney has expanded on his interest in young people by keeping in touch with the school, perman- ent building, recreation and human services commit- tees as well as centering on the LCC. Regional responsibility, beside reaching selectmen through well - publicized intertown projects and concerns such as Minuteman Bikeway and HATS II, also has found selectmen in some less limelit regional roles. Both Leo McSweeney and Jacquelyn Smith have been serving on the Middlesex County Advisory Board, Selectman Smith as secretary. She also has contin- ued on the MWRA Executive Board. Furthermore, the board has designated Selectman Dailey to represent Lexington the MBTA Advisory Board. Service to the Massachusetts Municipal Association (MMA). Members of the board continued their active involvement in the work of the MMA in 1987. Selectman Smith served as a member of the Public Works Policy Committee and Selectman Marshall served as Vice Chairman of the Fiscal Policy Committee. These committees are responsible for reviewing prospective legislation and representing the inter- ests of cities and towns in the Commonwealth. Mr. Marshall was also a member of the MMA Board of Directors and of the Governor's Local Government Advisory Committee. INFRASTRUCTURE AND GROWTH MANAGEMENT Infrastructure. As previously noted, the selectmen continued to give priority attention to the mainten- ance and selective improvement of the town's infra- structure. In 1987, 5.3 miles of streets were resurfaced, 4,015 feet of water mains relined and major progress made on the rehabilitation of school buildings. Allocations for other capital projects included $125,000 for parking lot maintenance, $120,000 for new sidewalks and $75,000 for improved heating for the Senior Center. The board also con- tinued pressing for progress on several state - financed projects. Bedford Street reconstruction. Negotiations by the selectmen and the town administration with the State Department of Public Works (DPW) and the representa- tives of the North Lexington community continued through 1987 in attempts to agree on a design for the reconstruction of Bedford Street north of Route 128. The major point of contention was access to and from Eldred Street. In February it appeared that a solution had been reached, with the state agreeing to a design providing direct access at Eldred Street without a traffic signal. This solu- tion received a mixed reaction from North Lexington and was subsequently abandoned when it became appar- ent that too many accidents were likely to result. The selectmen reopened the discussion with the DPW in October, with a renewed request for a sensor - actuated signal at Eldred Street along with updated traffic counts to show that the signal would not lead to excessive traffic queueing. The State DPW countered with a proposal to split the project into two parts and to proceed with construction on the Hartwell Avenue end while postponing decision on the Eldred Street issue. As the year ended, the town was considering the state's proposal and the state engineers were reviewing the town's traffic counts. Minuteman Bikeway. The board actively advanced the Minuteman Commuter Bikeway project, with Selectman Eddison serving both as the Lexington representative to the Bikeway Advisory Committee of the state De- partment of Environmental Management (DEM) and as chairman of the Lexington Bikeway Implementation Committee. On January 30, the advisory committee recommended the selection of Vollmer Associates as contractor for the design phase of the project, but it was not until late August that Vollmer was so designated by the DEM. Beginning in early September the advisory committee worked closely with the con- tractor on design considerations. On November 17, an initial concept plan was presented in Cary Hall to the Lexington bikeway committee and to interested Overview 9