The Kingston Board of Selectmen met on Tuesday, May 7. There was significant debate and discourse regarding ongoing and requested work from Eversource.
Community Relations Manager Ronit Goldstein appeared before the Board on behalf of Eversource. “For the last few months there have been a lot of questions from the town about the double poles on Main St., about the future padmount transformer, i.e. green box that will be at the library, and then most recently I know there is a public hearing relative to a pole on Maple St…. there’s two major projects in the town, the liability project will support 5-10,000 customers; it’s an upgrade to the circuit on Main St.” She explained that the work would allow them to achieve higher voltage and reduce power outages. She said that while those poles have been an “eyesore” she appreciates everyone’s patience as they completed the work. Town Adminstrator Keith Hickey said, “the pad at the library currently still has an orange traffic cone… two… on the pad that ultimately your infrastructure will sit on as well as… some sort of plastic cover… if you guys can just clean that up if nothing else… I know you don’t want to plant vegetation before you actually put the transformer in.”
Susan Sherman of Main Street spoke regarding the poles by Eversource. “I want to encourage the Selectmen to think long and hard on giving permission to extend this, it’s been two years, two years on Main St. and wherever else they’ve been… they’re putting in poles where there have never been poles before; in our new sidewalk and our sidewalks we know are not wide enough to begin with,” Sherman said. She also said that several neighbors have been reporting low-hanging wires that are making it difficult for ambulances to get to elderly residents. She also called it an “eyesore” and complained about all of the cones everywhere. “I just think we should slow down and try to get a look at this… when does it start; when will it end?,” Sherman said.
A representative for Eversource was there for a public hearing regarding the addition of a new pole on Maple Street Selectmen Chair Kimberley Emberg noted that the neighborhood was against the installation of the new pole. Emberg asked about timeframe and was told “normally it would be a couple of weeks turnaround.” Emberg said that one of her hesitations is that they were asked by the people who would supposedly benefit from the installation to say no to the new pole. Emberg said that she was inclined to say ‘no’ so that Eversource could speak directly to the neighbors’ concerns. Sherman spoke again saying that she doesn’t understand how there were representatives from Eversource and Verizon but neither can say when they will complete work. “I do think we need to have this planned and I don’t want to say let’s not deal with Landing Road and getting power to them, but there’s got to be a better way of doing this,” she said.
Pine DuBois, with the Jones River Watershed said, “the question I had asked at the hearing… was what is that pole; what does it mean? and I still don’t have an answer to that. I also wanted to bring up that this is a town park – it’s called Jones River Park, so adding another pole… right there where people go into the park as well as have stormwater on the side is something that the planner/designer should look into. I think what’s really lacking here is a comprehensive understanding of how energy flows.” She added, “people walk in this town, they bicycle in this town, we really need safe streets… I feel like we need a more comprehensive plan from you in order to get on your team.”
Carl Pike spoke up saying he felt that he was one of the only people in town that really supports businesses. He noted that residents typically boast about fewer and shorter power outages than other neighboring communities. “I believe strongly that Eversource is doing some of the right things,” he told the crowd and the Selectmen. “I would also encourage you to put that support into all businesses,” he added. Bouchard said, “One of the ways that we can support all businesses in Kingston is getting our streets a lot prettier so people want to drive down them.” Selectman Don Alcombright added, “Tall Timbers was a fiasco. It was a disaster; Eversource, you guys completely blew that.” Emberg stopped him calling it outside the scope of what they were discussing.
Selectman Eric Crone said, “I’ve been here since 2000, we’ve had a lot more storms, bigger storms knocking out power, I would say in the last five or six years to the point where I would say that four of my closest five neighbors have generators… but my mother is in Pembroke and when she’s out, she’s out and it isn’t awful and Hanson is bad… NSTAR vs. Eversource… ours are not as bad. To the extent that they’re being proactive in terms of putting up power lines that can then help reduce the outages at least for some people, is something we need to promote but I also think we need to protect our neighbors and the people who have asked for certain things going forward.”
Emberg moved to accept the work proposed by Eversource Energy on Maple Street contingent upon the removal of the double poles on Main Street prior to May 25 and contingent upon final written approval by Kingston Streets, Trees, and Parks Superintendent on the final location of that pole. The Selectmen agreed to the motion with the contingencies in place.
DuBois spoke again, this time on a different matter, “I’ve been counting fish, routinely, since 2005… this year, up at Silver Lake are the most fish I have ever seen anywhere in the region all in one place. It’s because of your dam removal embracement, thank you. But it brings a problem and I wanted to make you aware of it. The problem is that when these fish are four or five years old… the fish getting into the lake will lay 100,000 eggs… they want to get out come the end of July, August, September, October… so I need and I pray for your assistance in reaching out to the city of Brockton and DMF… that you work with us,” DuBois said.
She also addressed an old boat that is sitting with standing water and old leaves in town. She said that “we are the reasons we have so many mosquitos.” She asked people to get rid of standing water including bird baths, etc. Finally, DuBois implored people to wear repellent to protect themselves from both ticks and mosquitoes.
Emberg said they received a request from the U.S. Coastguard Auxilliary that towns on the South Shore support National Safe Boating Week by recognizing it with a proclamation. Selectman Tyler Bouchard read the proclamation that urged all boaters to always wear life jackets as well as take a boating safety course. The Selectmen voted unanimously to adopt May 18 through May 24 as National Safe Boating Week.
They also voted to recognize National Public Works Week and National Police Week. They invited the employees from those departments to stand up and be recognized and then gave them a round of applause.
Town Administrator Keith Hickey said that the new boat ramp “is in place and looks fantastic.” They said that the pouring of the concrete in the parking lot was the last step needing to be completed.
Hickey also said that the Planning Department and Conservation Department have applied for a 1.8 million resiliency grant “to position the town to potentially offer right of first refusal on the Correira Bog property on Wapping Rd.” Hickey further explained, “it’s one of the last pieces of property that we don’t have access to and oversight on to make sure that there’s no contamination that flows along the Jones River.”