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Students’ data security reviewed

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School District IT Director Chad Peters outlined for the School Committee how student data security is ensured on Wednesday, Oct. 10.

Superintendent of Schools Jeffrey Szymaniak indicated that Whitman Police Chief Scott Benton had sent him and Assistant Superintendent George Ferro an FBI update on student data breaches and pirates holding student data for ransom — usually in the form of crypto-currency such as Bitcoin.

“I’m pretty secure with what we have, but I want you and the public to know your student data is secure here at W-H,” Szymaniak said.

Peters explained that data security starts with the switch three years ago to virtualization and the elimination of computers with individual drives.

“All of our data is actually in our data center,” he said. “None of the data actually resides on the individual devices.”

In addition, there are multiple layers of virus protections both on the dummy PCs and in administrative areas, but in the form of deep-scanning anti-virus protection on virtualization and on the firewall for network connections and Cloud storage facilities. Anomalies of large amounts of data traffic going in and going out of the network are checked.

Switchers, routers and wireless equipment is also monitored, Peters said, as well as email security. He said information and data servers are also encrypted and backed up so any hacks with the intent to hold data for ransom would be futile.

“From a user’s perspective [in school], we have restricted accounts where users have restricted rights,” Peters said. “When they log onto a computer or virtualization, they can’t just install things.”

It protects the system from potential viruses imported via USB sticks or other installed devices or programs.

Committee members asked what kind of instruction was offered students to help them protect themselves on the Internet.

“With a lot of things going on in society now, with data breaches … I think that’s going to be one of our initiatives,” Peters said. “We communicate a lot of that with our staff. In their computer classes they teach digital literacy and digital citizenship. … From our perspective, I think we have to push a lot of that more.”

Ferro said the district now has teachers and media center staff teaching those skills in a Common Sense Media program, as well as an educational liaison to technology on a stipend basis.

“When it comes to educating staff, that’s when we rely on the technology department,” he said.

During the meeting W-H seniors Dorothy Dimascio-Donahue and Kaitlyn Molito were recognized for having been honored by the Mass. Association of School Superintendents as the two top academic students at WHRHS.

“It’s not just in the classroom that they excel, it’s all over the place,” Szymaniak said. “They are true Panthers through-and-through — in student government, student activities, they study hard, they’re good citizens, and I think we should all be proud when they graduate this year, sending them off as ambassadors of WHRHS.”

The School Committee also welcomed interim Director of Student Services Lauren Mathisen, who has been an employee of the district for four years and an 18-year veteran educator. She started as a school psychologist and has worked at WHRHS as the special education coordinator for the last four years, focusing on inclusion and new programs on social-emotional health, including the program that helps students returning from either medical or psychiatric hospitalizations return to the classroom and school community.

In other business, Szymaniak reviewed — and the School Committee accepted — his goals for the 2018-19 school year, a process he said is one in which he is still learning some aspects of the job.

“I felt like putting ‘Survival’ this year wasn’t appropriate [to include],’ he quipped. “Some things that Ruth [Gilbert-Whitner] has left as legacy, I’ve pruned down the wording so I think they are manageable and user-friendly.”

Szymaniak’s goals, for which he outlined potential strategies,  include:

• Supporting student learning through a focus on support for the math program, English language learners, expansion of special education — with a focus on in-district programs that can best serve students while saving money for the district — and continuing efforts to provide free all-day kindergarten;

• Being visible throughout the district, with planned and un-planned visits to all schools during the week and meetings with teachers and student leaders;

• Improve and create open lines of communication in conjunction with the district’s focus on safety and security, which includes a planned ALICE training session for staff on Friday, Oct. 19 — an early release day, and grade-level safety training for students and parent meetings; and

• Development of a workable budget that will deliver services and create opportunities to prepare W-H students for higher education, the workforce and/or military service.

Member Christopher Howard asked how Szymaniak felt about the template over-all.

“I don’t love it,” Szymaniak said. “I don’t love it at all, but here’s the thing … but this is what the committee has always gone to. Ours is more of leadership, of facilities, of a professional culture and then family. … It’s kind of a teacher template and our administrative template that everybody else uses in the district.”

Howard agreed that to start somewhere it is easier to start with what is already in place, but trying to measure success is the difficult work.

“I would encourage that we start here but, at some point we rework the template,” Howard said. Szymaniak and several other school committee members agreed. Member Fred Small suggested a simpler format including, goals, measurement indicators and evidence of attainment.

“I personally am not looking at this as a hard-fast, set-in-stone report card, so to speak,” Small said. “I look at a relationship [where] everyone’s working together for the common good. … It’s important to set a goal more important to say how you are going to achieve the goal and how it can be measured.”

Hanson assured on gas safety

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HANSON — The Board of Selectmen on Tuesday, Oct. 16 heard assurances from Columbia Gas of Massachusetts officials that, once a work moratorium ends on Dec. 1, it will continue in a safe manner.

“Help us make people in Hanson feel safe that you guys are going to be doing work here,” said  Selectman Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett.

Whitman’s Board of Selectmen meeting the same night was canceled due to a posting issue. That board will meet at 7 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 23.

Columbia’s Director of Governmental Affairs from the Westboro corporate offices Michael F. Kane and Field Engineer Nick Wilson out of the Brockton Division briefed Hanson Selectmen at the board’s request.

“We’re more interested in you guys’ assuring us that current gas project you’re working on at Whitman and Winter streets [is safe] — that’s been the kind of question that’s been asked by different residents,” Selectmen Chairman Kenny Mitchell said.

“We just want to make sure that you’re going to be putting protocols in place in our project that are going to prevent any type of catastrophic situation like there was in Lawrence and Andover,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said.

Kane said he could not go into detail about the investigation still being conducted by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), despite the release of a preliminary report from that agency.

“There’s still more investigation that goes into it,” Kane said. “They’ve asked us not to talk about any more of the investigation” What he did outline was the difference between the companies divisions and the work they do.

“Nothing is intertwined with any type of gas lines running in between those areas,” he said. “All serve differently from the pipeline distributor that would provide gas to us. There are three different types of system and no relation to the Merrimack Valley incident and our piping here in Hanson.”

FitzGerald-Kemmett asked if the contractor is, indeed, the same as was involved in work in the Merrimack Valley when last month’s explosions and fires occurred.

Kane and Wilson confirmed that.

“We have many different contractors that come in, and of our contractors, all of them run operator qualifications [reviews] that have to pass through our Northeast Gas Association,” Kane said. “All of them have Massachusetts hoisting licenses — all of the licenses that are required to be a gas operator in the field.”

Contractors must meet the same qualifications as Columbia Gas employees, Kane stressed.

Selectmen Wes Blauss noted the Dec. 1 moratorium deadline was in place, but asked where the project stood in general.

Wilson said safety measures in place in Hanson include an underground regulator pit that is being brought above ground and replacing the two-regulator runs with a three-run station.

“We are installing the Cadillac of regulators,” Wilson said. “These regulators have numerous controls, numerous safety features on them. It’s going to be an upgrade to the station and to the property.”

Once the work is done, it will be run parallel to the existing system for a while until safety tests are completed, according to Wilson. While most of the piping in the street is done, he said that there are additional excavations needed to “liven those gas lines up” after the moratorium is lifted, but most of the remaining work will be in the station itself and a building constructed over it.

WHCA update

In other business, Whitman-Hanson Community Access TV Executive Director Eric Dresser presented an update to the board, including progress in the investigation of a vandalism that damaged the sign at the Whitman office this month.

“We’ve been in the news a couple of times this week,” he said, noting that they also shared footage of the medical emergency during the Friday, Oct. 12 football game with other media outlets. “The other was the vandalism that occurred in our building, which — I’m happy to report — we have identified a suspect for that who has admitted guilt and is going to make right on that.”

He said anyone who helped share security camera footage they posted online was instrumental in helping resolve that crime.

Dresser reported that fiber-optic transmission has improved the quality of video broadcast from meetings and other events. They have also installed new windows and security cameras while bringing their edit lab online.

He also brought in letters of support he hoped Selectmen would sign onto to prevent franchise competition resulting from new 5G hardware, which can be posted on utility poles, competing unfairly with their funding source. The other legislation of concern would permit cable companies to seek charge-backs to local access channels for what they consider in-kind services.

polar plunge

Selectmen also approved a request from Melissa Valachovic on behalf of the Hanson PTO to receive a reduced fee for use of Needles Lodge and Cranberry Cove at Camp Kiwanee for a Polar Plunge fundraiser on Sunday, Jan. 27.

“As an active member of the PTO, I’ve been trying to think of ways to bring the community together — and in a way that also supports the children here in our community,” Valachovic said. “My husband has been talking about doing a polar plunge for years and it never fits in with his schedule … We have Cranberry Cove in our town, a body of water that we could jump into when it’s really cold.”

She shared the idea with the PTO and town department heads over the summer and, after some initial doubts, all of the groups came on board. Safety, traffic and potential snow removal concerns were also discussed with public safety personnel as well as school officials.

Participants will be registered online and will be asked to line up sponsors.

“If you can get [Selectman] Jim Hickey to sign up and jump in, you’ve got my support” Mitchell joked.

Valachovic said she did hope some town officials or prominent citizens would sign up to support and participate in the project.

“Are you telling me right now you’re going to get me to go in, or would you rather do it in private, Mr. Chairman?” Hickey asked.

“We’ll do it in private,” Mitchell said.

Valachovic said Jan. 27 was picked because it was NFL Pro Bowl day “which nobody watches anyway,” but cautioned a weather delay would mean rescheduling it to Super Bowl Sunday, Feb. 3.

“But it’s in the morning, so you can [do the] jump, get warm and then be ready to enjoy the game,” she said.

If the pond is frozen over, she has already lined up the Fire and Highway departments to cut through the ice along the beach area.

Scaring up scholarships

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By Brooke Loring
W-H student intern

WHITMAN — This past weekend, the town of Whitman put on the first ever Great Pumpkin Classic Car Show in an effort to raise scholarship money for Whitman-Hanson’s Class of 2019 and the town’s recreation programs. Held at Whitman Middle School, dozens of community members (as well as automobile aficionados) participated in a variety of Halloween-themed activities, raffles, and contests. Food from the Away Café food truck was featured as well. This event was thanks to a collaboration of Whitman Assistant Town Administrator Lisa Green, Recreation Director Oliver Amado, and Whitman-Hanson’s Dollars for Scholars.

Also among those who attended were student volunteers, DFS Administrator, Michael Ganshirt, said he hoped students learned from the experience that, “when you give back to the community, the community gives back to you.”

Overall, the event raised $1,742 for this year’s graduating class of Whitman-Hanson Regional High School. Due to the event’s success, hopefully this becomes a new and unique tradition for the town. The Great Pumpkin Classic Car Show brought the community together for a fun and festive Sunday.   

Characters count: Edwin Hill discusses ‘Little Comfort’

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WHITMAN — It was a literary homecoming.

Author Edwin Hill spoke about the process of writing his debut novel “Little Comfort” at the Whitman Public Library on Thursday, Sept. 27 — to a crowd that included old friends and family members of the writer whose grandmother Phyllis Hill was the librarian in Whitman from the 1940s to the late ’60s.

Many in the room had not yet read the mystery-thriller featuring Hester Thursby, a petite Harvard librarian who takes care of her 3-year-old niece, her non-husband Morgan Maguire and a Bassett hound named Waffles while working on missing persons cases in her spare time.

The book has been out for just over a month with Hill still a bit nervous in only his fifth book talk, and the first without a moderator, in support of the novel.

His talk focused on how the novel developed, focusing on three main characters — Hester, Sam Blaine and Gabe DiPuriso.

“I actually worked on the novel so long [eight years], that I actually forgot a lot of this and it’s been fun over the last month to just discover it,” Hill said, noting that the Clark Rockefeller case was his entry point. Christian Gerhartsreiter — AKA Clark Rockefeller — was a professional imposter who kidnapped his daughter and was later convicted of murder.

“I saw that story and I thought, ‘I always wanted to be a writer, I’m going to write something,’” he said. The resulting two-and-a-half-page theme sat on his computer for years. He knew his villain would be named Sam and that he had “done something bad, and left town.”

Hill would open the file occasionally, read it and think to himself, “That is terrific.” Then he would close it again.

In between jobs he started to write a novel on it, but ended up keeping Sam, but needed a foil. Thus Hester was created.

Hester’s living situation with her non-husband in a three-family home where they kept separate apartments, and her fondness for dark films featuring strong women, informed her character, Hill explained.

He read from his book to illustrate how he introduced each of his three main characters.

Hester, for example, drinks her coffee with cream and seven sugars — a passage that has drawn knowing laughter in each of his talks so far.

Sam is based on that friend everyone seems to have who can get away with anything, but he’s also a serial killer who always knows when to get out of town.

“He really knows how to get into these people’s lives,” Hill said, explaining that Sam’s crossing paths with a librarian like Hester, for whom finding information is her job, illustrates how information has changed life in the Internet era. “If you wanted to disappear right now, you’d really have to work at it. It’s really hard.”

That also serves to shift the theme from the search for someone to what happens after Hester finds him.

Gabe, meanwhile, is Sam’s human collateral damage.

“For me, he sort of turned into the heart of the novel,” Hill said. “He’s the character who changes the most — from someone who seems very lost, who seems very disconnected from the world — and he changes in the novel in a way that, I think, he and Hester certainly have a strange bond at the end.”

He uses narrative discourse for all but the most essential dialogue from Gabe to keep the reader at a distance from the character, especially at the beginning of the story.

Audience members asked if the characters — or story — came first and are they based on real people, how he picked Boston/Somerville as the setting and how Hester ended up being so short.

The title has nothing to do with Whitman, save that it used to be called Little Comfort and he always liked that phrase.

Hill put a bit of himself in Hester’s love of horror movies and her sloppy habits and used his understanding of loneliness in creating Gabe, but tries not to base whole characters on real people.

He said the scene he wrote all those years ago, while not in the book at all, was his gateway to finding Hester.

A writer who likes contrast, Hill was looking for traits that made it hard to not notice, an occupational drawback for someone who follows people for a living. He also wanted her to be someone who has to fight a little bit.

“It was story first, then character, then story, then character, and with a mystery novel, you always want to make sure that there’s tension and that there’s forward momentum in that story,” he said.

Hill lived in Somerville for several years and works in Boston.

“The easiest reason is write what you know,” he said. “Hester basically lives in the [imaginary] house next door to the one I lived in. … Somerville has a nice mix of population.”

Beacon Hill gave him a chance to “play with class” and in Boston one can travel from an urban to suburban or rural area easily.

Hester returns in Hill’s next book, “The Missing Ones,” due out in September 2019.

Planning hopefuls interview

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WHITMAN — The Board of Selectmen, in a joint meeting with the Planning Board Tuesday, Sept. 24, interviewed two candidates for interim appointment to fill vacancies on that board.

Planning Board candidates Elaine Bergeron, Jerry Blumenthal and Adele Carew appeared at the joint session. The board is being sequentially reduced in membership, as voted at Town Meeting, to get down to a five-member board after the next election because of problems gaining a quorum in order to hold meetings.

One of the now-vacant positions disappears after next year because of the reduction of members. One of the two would then have to run to fill the seat that would be vacant.

Blumenthal had to leave the meeting, due to a family emergency, before the hearing, which was delayed due to an extended discussion during the public forum, could be opened. Town Administrator Frank Lynam said he is interested in serving on the Planning Board.

Selectmen Chairman Dr. Carl Kowalski suggested that because of Blumenthal’s early departure and the absence of a Planning Board member who wished to take part in the vote, the hearing could be continued to the Thursday, Sept. 16 meeting when he could be interviewed and a vote taken.

With five members, only three need to attend to achieve a quorum, mandatory to open mail and address bills, let alone talk to developers or others seeking to present plans to the board.

“What I’d like to do is, first and foremost … I’d like to have the definition changed so a majority of active board members, not sitting positions, would constitute a quorum, no less than three members,” said Chairman Eric Pretorius.

“Unfortunately, that would require a statutory action,” said Lynam. “It would require Home Rule legislation, because the quorums are established by law.”

To vote on membership, however, Lynam said only a majority of both boards would be necessary. Pretorius said no surveying experience is needed; one only has to be able to read through rules and regulations and ask questions.

Whitman native Bergeron served on the Finance Committee in the 1970s and has been a member of the Whitman-Hanson  Scholarship Foundation for almost 40 years as well as serving as an election worker. She is currently a senior vice president director of personal insurance, overseeing a staff of 60 both directly and indirectly, for a large insurance agency. Among her duties are figuring out what houses are worth and how they should be insured.

“I want to get back involved in the town,” she said. “I’m getting close to retirement, so I’ll have more time.

Selectman Dan Salvucci asked if she planned to run at the next election, but she did not have a definite plan for that, but intends to run.

“If I commit, I’ll commit,” she said.

Selectman Brian Bezanson, who has known Bergeron for many years, endorsed her and thanked her for stepping forward.

A 56-year Whitman resident, Carew is an Abington High graduate and has been a warden at Whitman polls for 45 years and is interested in some of the building in her Kenwood Drive neighborhood. She has also been a school volunteer.

If appointed, Carew said she would be willing to run for election “if the board felt I was adequate to do it.”

Bezanson also thanked her for her interest.

“We don’t get many volunteers for these boards and they’re not elected and certainly not paid, so any time we can get citizens to come forward, we really appreciate it,” he said.

Selectman Randy LaMattina said he has known Carew for a long time and she is someone who is committed to the town.

In other business, Selectman Scott Lambiase reported that he has reached out to several people regarding the budget working group that was slated to meet at 7 p.m., Monday Oct. 1 in the Selectmen’s meeting room at Town Hall. Agenda items were to include introductions and giving participants a “feel of what we’re here for, what we’re going to do,” important dates and milestones.

Lynam said the town would see a penultimate draft of the community assessment survey within a few days of the Sept. 24 Selectmen’s meeting.

Hanson to query gas firm

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HANSON — Selectmen will be meeting with a representative of Columbia Gas at the 7 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 16 meeting of the Board of Selectmen.

A hearing with the owners of the JJ’s Pub property is also being scheduled, to force them to clear away debris from the July 5 fire that destroyed the vacant building.

Selectmen had Building Inspector Bob Curran write letters demanding the property be cleared, with the last one — authorized on Sept. 18 — carrying a two-week deadline for a reply.

“We’re going to move forward as soon as possible,” Town Administrator Michael McCue said Tuesday, Sept. 25. That hearing will likely be Oct. 16. “We’ll line it up for that date and if something breaks in the meantime, we’ll have it lined up just in case.”

McCue reached out to Columbia Gas on Sept. 25 to arrange that meeting with the board and asked them to provide a representative to address any concerns about natural gas line and service safety Selectmen may have and to update them on the facility they are building in town.

“They’ve been very cooperative,” McCue said. “I continue to receive questions and concerns about the facility and the gas lines in general and [in] the town of Hanson.”

He said he expects that work on the new facility, still in the construction phase and referred to as a regulator station, at Whitman and East Washington streets is being done properly, but aims to have the public “hopefully glean a sense of security” that they are.

The existing underground regulator station is still in service and will remain in service until next summer  according to a company official.

Selectman Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett had reached out to McCue on the issue as a result of multiple residents calls to her.

“Yes, Columbia Gas is an issue,” she said. “But now they’re finding that there were insufficient gas inspectors at the state level and they are questioning that. I also had somebody point out that it’s likely the same contractor that is being used here that was used in Lawrence, so we’ve got that additional concern.”

McCue said they became aware that the same contractor was involved after the Sept. 18 Selectmen’s meeting.

“I think it warrants somebody coming in and answering questions that the board may have,” he said.

FitzGerald-Kemmett said the main question would be how the company is going to negate any risks and make sure there is not a repeat of the Lawrence incident in Hanson.

“I don’t want somebody coming in and placating us and giving the song-and-dance or whatever,” she said. “I really would like to know what are they doing to vet contractors. … I’d rather that they mothball the project for awhile if they don’t have the right resources to do it properly.”

McCue noted it is a legitimate concern as the company, for appropriate reasons, is now focusing all its resources on the Merrimack Valley.

In other business, McCue said the town’s proposed Tax Incentive Financing (TIF) program article on the special Town Meeting warrant was being passed over Monday, Oct. 1 because the TIF Committee reached a consensus that more time is needed to prepare the proposal, which should be ready for the May Town Meeting.

The decision followed meetings last month with the state officials and TIF proponents.

“The TIF only takes effect in the coming fiscal year,” McCue said. “Since we had the extra time and we really weren’t going to put the proponent in an awkward situation, we made the decision, jointly, to go a bit slower.”

McCue and FitzGerald-Kemmett both stressed the postponement does not mean officials are not “extremely bullish” on pursuing the program, but the infrastructure is not yet in place and there is other information the town needs.

“We want to get the first one right,” FitzGerald-Kemmett said. “If this proves to be as beneficial as we think it will be, in improving Main Street, we’re hoping this will bee the first of several TIFs that we might entertain to get that area cleaned up.”

Indictments in Hanson arson

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BROCKTON – Alfred Russo, 75, who had already been arrested in late August on arson charges in the burning of the abandoned J.J’s Pub, 16 Liberty Street, in Hanson, has been indicted along with two new co-conspirators, Patricia Harrison, 59, and Wayne Cummings, 49, all of Buzzards Bay.

According to a statement by District Attorney Timothy Cruz, Russo was indicted on one count of burning of a dwelling and two counts of arson causing injuries to a firefighter. Harrison and Cummings were each indicted on one count of burning of a building.

The Plymouth County Grand Jury returned the indictments on Friday, Sept. 28.

The fire, which Hanson Fire Chief Jerome Thompson, III, said nearly reached four alarms, destroyed the commercial property — abandoned for approximately five-years — adjacent to the intersections of Liberty Street and East and West Washington Streets. Investigators deemed it to be an estimated $400,000 loss, according to court documents.

The fire sent two firefighters to area hospitals, Lieutenant Sherilyn Mullin as well as Timothy Royer, who both sustained heat-related injuries, and had to miss some work due to these injuries, stated court documents.

It took some time to extinguish, due to the full involvement of the structure, according to a previous statement from the district attorney, and many towns and the state responded or provided station coverage for Hanson during the incident, according to Thompson.

Harrison is the owner of the abandoned property and Cummings is Harrison’s longtime boyfriend. The indictments allege that the pair conspired, and assisted Russo, in the arson of the building.

In a police interview, the owner of the Hanson property, Harrison, said she and the defendant, Russo, a friend, were together at her home when she received a call from her real estate agent about the fire. Harrison’s boyfriend, Cummings, says he was out walking the dog when he received word of the fire from Harrison.

Yet both Harrison and Cummings identified Russo’s Jeep, in Hanson, when shown it in later interviews from cameras across from JJ’s Pub at times proximate to the fire, according to the State Police report.

Video surveillance from Dandel Construction Corporation was used to identify a party park a vehicle on the side of the building, enter through a door and remain inside for nearly eight minutes, according to the report. The party then exits, enters a vehicle and drives away. About six minutes after the party exits the structure, smoke is visible venting from the roof, it continues. Less than nine minutes later, fire is visible out of a side window.

When investigators went to meet Russo at his home in Bourne two weeks after the incident, police say he, “spontaneously stated that he was driving his Jeep in Hanson on the day of the fire.”

Russo, who was then taken for a voluntary interview at the Bourne Police Department, stated that he had been in Hanson on the day of the fire for a cookout at Cummings’ sister’s house, but didn’t end up attending because he didn’t feel well, according to the report.

He freely admitted to driving to the JJ’s Pub property, purportedly to move a generator, but said he never went inside, according to police.

In an interview with the Express, Russo blamed the fire on “spontaneous combustion,” and noted that his presence there was a “bad coincidence.”

The Hanson Fire Department’s official Twitter account tweeted: “Great Job by everyone involved from the investigators from the State Police and Hanson Police to the District Attormeys [sic] Office for getting these individual [sic] indicted.”

Fire Chief Thompson had previously been publicly critical of the Judge who originally arraigned Russo when he was first arrested.

The three will be arraigned at a later date in Brockton Superior Court.

Whitman officer is honored

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WHITMAN — Police Officer Mark Poirier was presented two citations for his arrest of murder suspect Allan Warner who was wanted for the death of his estranged wife Shana Warner last week in Marshfield.

Police Chief Scott Benton of Whitman police addressed colleagues as well as family and local politicians to praise Poirier’s swift apprehension.

“I have this opportunity certainly to highlight some great police work — that I am not surprised — was done by Officer Mark Poirier of our police department,” Benton said. “He apprehended homicide fugitive Allen Warner who had brutally murdered his ex-wife –to- be in Marshfield the day before (Monday, Sept. 24).”

Poirier has been a patrolman and a detective for the Whitman police. He is a lifelong Whitman resident and graduate of the W-H class of 1990.

“Mark is conscientious about what he does and how he does his job,”said Benton.

On Sept 25  there was a call to police about a hit-and-run involving a flatbed tow truck that struck potted plants at Dunkin’ Donuts drive through on South Avenue. Poirier contacted the truck company and found out it had been stolen.

During the investigation, Poirier witnessed the truck pulling in to the company where it was stolen and engaged the operator who tried to back up and flee.

He recognized the suspect despite the change in his appearance. Benton commended Poirier for his vigilance in the capture of Warner doing so safely in which no one else was hurt, he said.

“We are lucky to have him here, I am thankful to have him here and the citizens of Whitman are certainly served well by Mark as a police officer,” said Benton.

A Citation from the Massachusetts General Court was presented by state Rep. Geoff Diehl, R-Whitman, commending the actions of Poirier. After a summer of upheaval for officers across the country, Diehl said he was pleased to see a local officer commended for doing his job right.

“I think Whitman is such a lucky town to have great leadership under Scott Benton our Chief and the great training that has led to the apprehension that could have gone a whole different bunch of ways — but in this case it went the right way and Officer Poirier was able to successfully apprehend someone who was a threat to the community, a threat to the South Shore,” said Diehl.

He also acknowledged Poirier’s family as the backbone of support for a job that is so dangerous.

“I think the other thing that goes unnoticed is the family behind him that supports what he does every day. When you are an officer in Massachusetts, across the country or right here in Whitman when you go out there to serve the public what you are doing is saying- no matter what the case is I’m going out there and keep you safe,” said Diehl.

State senator Mike D. Brady, D-Brockton, also commended the work of Officer Poirier and presented him with a citation on behalf of the Senate.

Poirier’s wife Stephanie, daughter Savannah, 15, and son Mark Jr., 18, along with his parents Pete and Marilyn were also present to congratulate him.

Sparks fly over fiscal planning

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WHITMAN — Fiscal planning procedures and priorities again took center stage during a sometimes fiery discussion at the Tuesday, Sept. 25 Board of Selectmen’s meeting.

Resident Shawn Kain again raised the issue of the need for a five-year capital plan, criticizing the Building Needs and Capital Expenditures Committee for not providing a report for the town’s Annual Report.

Town Administrator Frank Lynam said the committee opted against forwarding a capital plan “until we had numbers.”

“It’s a way of thinking and, perhaps, we need to change it,” Lynam said. “On the plus side, I did apply for and did receive two grants from the Commonwealth Compact, a program that the Selectmen signed up for almost three years ago.”

The best practices grants are: a financial management approval to aid in preparing a capital improvement plan that reflects community needs set up within an annually reviewed finance plan that reflects the community’s ability to pay; and a financial management package that established budget documents detailing all revenues and expenditures as well as a narrative for the public’s benefit and clear, transparent communication of all financial policies.

Lynam credited Kain for focusing on those issues as directly as he has, and extended to him an invitation to join the Building Needs and Capital Expenditures Committee and to take over Lynam’s position as chairman.

Selectmen Chairman Dr. Carl Kowalski, agreed with the invitation as a good move for the town.

Kain replied that he appreciated the invitation and that the Commonwealth Compact initiatives are sound ones, but said he is not interested in joining the committee this year.

“I feel like you have the critical pieces in place to make decisions quickly and to get action done,” he said. “I think my role in that might just confuse things, honestly.”

Earlier in the meeting, Kowalski had criticized the “Debbie Downer act” Kain has been playing about the success — or lack of it — on the part of Selectmen and others in town government.

“I just need to cast some balance to that,” he said, noting he prefers the direct approach to the use of social media. “This is the way our system is sort of set up, we have an open Town Meeting, once a year, that governs the town. We have open Selectmen meetings every two weeks in which we speak to the town — speak to each other. Sometimes we make motions, sometimes we are voted down.”

Kain stressed that, with the new modes of communication out there “is the ability to stop and do research and respond thoroughly,” something that’s difficult to do even in the forum of a Selectmen’s meeting.

“I like the opportunity to speak,” he said, in agreement with Kowalski. “I’m still an old-school person [and] I love Town Meeting, but this new form of communication that allows us to do a little more depth — there are people who use it for superficial reasons, but that hasn’t been me.”

taking issue

Kowalski said that Kain’s suggestion that Selectmen were guilty of incompetence or recklessness “just doesn’t meet the facts.” The boards basic goals over the past several years, have been to keep taxes low during the recession, to lay no people off from town jobs and to address major capital needs, he noted.

“I think a look at our history will show that we’ve done that,” Kowalski said. “We’ve ranked since [over the past nine years], 11th, 10th, 11th, 10th, 11th, 14th, 13th, 15th  and 12th out of 18 [area communities], with one being the highest tax rate on that scale.”

Since 2010, the town has added $3.61 to the tax rate, which puts Whitman 10th out of those 18 towns. No town layoffs were made and only five new hires have been made over the last 10 years —other than in the schools, which have a different budget structure — while the town accomplished capital needs projects such as building a new high school, police station, K-8 school renovations, as well as renovations to Town Hall and the fire station, Kowalski pointed out.

“We are short-staffed … and that comes at a cost that keeps us from doing some of the things I know you would like us to do and that we would like to do as well,” he said. “You’re right, we need to do better with respect to formalizing and writing our planning and operating procedures.”

Assistant Town Administrator Lisa Green has been working on updating procedures and policy guidelines for that reason. The process for developing a strategic plan has also begun, Kowalski noted.

Where the capital planning and operations are concerned, Lynam said the town has worked cooperatively, between the Board of Selectmen, Finance Committee and himself to identify budget and capital priorities are each year.

“I will take fault in two things,” Lynam said. “That we have not reduced it to a written plan and that I have not filed the plans for the last two and a half years.”

But Lynam stressed the things that have been accomplished. He said every year a balanced budget is delivered with appropriate funding for departments and spending based on priorities. In 2014 alone, to purchase equipment, improve buildings or service debt, the town spent $956,000 on schools including new equipment and debt service on the high school; $1,289,000 on town projects, including debt service to a project completed in 1999 and another completed in 2011. Another $53,000 was spent on town vehicles; $189,000 on fire equipment and vehicles; $692,000 on debt service for new water mains; $246,000 on repairs to pumping stations and $329,000 on roads.

“The most significant source of funds for capital improvement, by-and-large, has been our free cash,” Lynam said.

The Police Department project, presented in to Town Meeting in 2008, was done because the old police station had personnel “almost under the gun” by way of a safe work environment. It would have been presented as a debt exclusion had there been a full Select Board — there were only four Selectmen and one refused to vote to present a debt exclusion.

“Ironically, according to state law, it only takes three votes to present an override, but it takes four to present a debt exclusion, presumably because how long it runs,” he said. A special Town Meeting, attended by 265 people, of whom 223 — or 81 percent — voted to support the project within the levy limit via free cash.

“To say that this wasn’t planned would be a misstatement,” he said. He also said the town has a five-year projection, but the only significant source of growth revenue is Proposition 2 ½.

‘In crisis’

“We are in crisis,” Kain had repeated. “There are a lot of people — good people — whose jobs are on the line with what we do over the next year. … I have no personal hard feelings about anybody on the board, honestly I don’t.”

But he encouraged a “hard look through a business lens,” at the way the town has been run over the course of recent years, and argued the long-serving members of the board are unable to take an objective view of that.

“I can’t yet say the situation is as dire as you say, but I’m not saying the situation isn’t serious,” Kowalski said.

Resident Mary Fox pointed to the new police station, air-conditioning in Town Hall and recently added firefighters as misuses of town funds. She also pointed to police logs as evidence that officers are not helping the town — arguing they should be writing more tickets to bring in revenue and control traffic violations — and arguing against out-of-state travel to conferences as a waste of money.

“I’ve been up here about the trips,” she said. “Now I want no trips. You thought it was bad I didn’t want you to go out of state and you pull a fast one, the guy already got his permission. … We have to cut back.”

She also argued for pay freezes.

Police Chief Scott Benton, however, had heard enough.

“This is a great country and, no matter how rational or irrational we may think somebody is, everybody gets to speak,” Benton. “I will tell you that, number one, to even question the integrity or the character of anybody on the Whitman Police Department, I find insulting. … Everybody has a story and everybody has a journey and I’ve heard yours over and over.”

Benton told Fox she never has anything positive to say, adding “it doesn’t get us anywhere.”

He answered Fox’s criticism on citation quotas by noting that same afternoon his officers arrested a homicide suspect.

Town divided

“Good police work, that’s what that was,” he said. “The residents of this town can take a lot of confidence in knowing that the people that serve the Police Department in Whitman serve it well. … I have a problem with a person that rises and sleeps under the very blanket of freedom and safety that we provide and the questions the manner in which we provide it. I’d rather you just said thank you, myself.”

He admitted he doesn’t know where the town is going fiscally, but added he is confident that the people will make the right decisions as when residents voted to add firefighters to meet the needs of the Fire Department and community.

“By offending people or attacking people, nothing’s going to get done,” he said. “All we’re going to do is divide each other — and when we’re divided, we’re going to fall.”

Kowalski agreed the town doesn’t do enough to praise the department’s work and thanked Benton for officer Mark Poirier’s work in making Tuesday’s arrest.

Kain said his purpose in using social media is not to express his disagreement with town officials. Kowalski countered that there are dangers to social media, as one member of the board found out during the previous week.

“I’m very happy you brought that up now,” Selectman Randy LaMattina said. “I welcome this discussion. The route we’re going to go, I welcome it. That was a very bad choice of words on your behalf, but if we’re going to have it, we’re definitely going to have it.”

Kowalski continued, saying that people can hijack your Facebook personality and send the wrong message to people.

“That’s what I was going to say, Randy,” he said.

Hanson splits vote on cannabis shops

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HANSON — Voters at special Town Meeting Monday, Oct. 1 narrowly approved an article amending the General Bylaws in order to prohibit the retail sale of recreational cannabis products, but failed to achieve the two-thirds majority required by a second article to amend the town’s Zoning Bylaws.

Both will also appear on a Nov. 6 town ballot, but the zoning question is effectively moot — leaving the town to depend on a bylaw approved in May restricting retail marijuana businesses to an overlay district with frontage on Route 27/ Main Street and Franklin Street.

“The reason why we have two separate bylaws on this Town Meeting warrant is because there is some question as to whether or not a General Bylaw will serve to prohibit,” said Town Counsel Katherine Feodoroff. “It’s potentially challengeable.”

She said her firm would do their best to protect the town if a challenge is received.

The 50-45 vote in support of the General Bylaw included those who out-and-out support the financial benefit such businesses represent for the town — such as all five Finance Committee members and three selectmen — and those who waned to give more voters the chance to vote on the issue. The Zoning Bylaw article’s 49-43 vote supporting it failed the two-thirds margin required by zoning articles — amid confusion over the difference between the two.

A question arose centering on the vote total on the General Bylaw as to whether a quorum still existed, but a handful of people, including Moderator Sean Kealy, said they had not voted.

Yes votes were in support of the prohibitions, no votes were in favor of allowing retail cannabis sales in town.

“We look at everything from a fiduciary standpoint,” said Finance Committee member Kevin Sullivan in explaining his board’s position. “It’s not our job to interpret whether or not the citizenry should take another vote. We looked at this as any other business coming into town, it’s a valid stream of revenue that comes to the town — quite frankly, we’re in desperate need of revenue.”

Town officials, however, declined to estimate how much tax revenue such businesses might generate, while others spoke of financial boosts already realized by towns of comparative size in Colorado, California and Washington.

“We feel that it would be irresponsible for us to try and estimate that,” said Selectman Laura FitzGerald-Kemmett. “It’s a new business. … Anyone trying to do a business plan would be very hard-pressed to figure that out.”

“Like any other business, we wouldn’t measure validity of it based on revenue,” Sullivan said.

“The main reason that I’m voting yes on this article … is that I certainly want, for the very first time Hanson is going to be possibly authorizing sale of recreational marijuana,” resident Bruce Young of Indian Head Street said of the General Bylaw question. “I certainly want to maximize the democratic process.”

He argued that the town’s 7,600 voters should decide the issue, not a quorum of 108 people at a town meeting.

Resident Annette Benenato of Brookside Drive, meanwhile, expressed concern over the type of products sold by such businesses, including edible products such as gummie candies, lollipops, sodas and baked treats containing THC, the psycho-active compound in cannabis.

“These marijuana products are appealing to our youth and there is growing scientific literature that shows adolescents and young adults who are regular marijuana users are at increased risk for addiction and mental health disorders,” she said. Benenato also argued that youth use rates are highest where cannabis is legal, that sales tax revenue will not present a tax windfall and the town has a right to opt out of retail sales.

Patrick Powers of Holmes Street reported that health department reports in Colorado and Washington both found that marijuana use actually decreased among youth in grades six through 12 after legalization as well as a 6.5 decrease in opioid overdose deaths. He also said children are not allowed in cannabis shops where customers must show ID to enter and wait in a waiting room before they are assisted by a certified employee who has passed background checks. No products are on display in the shops.

“We as a town of 7,000-plus voters have had a chance three times — this is our fourth, November will be the fifth — to come and voice their opinions,” Powers said. “So to say that our town hasn’t had a chance to come and vote on this issue, either on a state ballot or at a town meeting … is a complete falsehood.”

Joseph Campbell of Woodbine Avenue argued that Hanson would benefit from tax revenue on both the local and state level, noting that similar towns out west have benefits for land-locked towns with slowing growth.

“We have an opportunity knocking at our door,” Campbell said, noting individual moral decisions must take place in the home. “If you have a liquor store at the end of your street, is that going to make you an alcoholic? Probably not.”

He stressed that the Board of Selectmen will retain the right to grant or rescind licenses as well as bestowing the financial “gifts” of taxes from the businesses to public safety and school needs.

Thomas Pellerin of Waltham Street, who moved to Hanson from Lynn 21 years ago, said he has seen what drugs can do to a community from living in Lynn.

“Hanson has been a nice community and I think this would change that community,” he said. “Do we really want this for our town?”

Planning Board member Joseph Gamache asked Police Chief Michael Miksch to weigh in on the issue.

Miksch, who does not live in town, quipped that he really didn’t want to comment.

“I’ve been asked to speak about this a number of times,” he said. “This isn’t what Mike Miksch wants. But it doesn’t matter what I want. Whatever laws you pass, that’s what we enforce.”

He said he didn’t want to get into the financial question, but said a friend who serves as a major in the Colorado State Police has reported that accidents and impaired driving citations have increased. There is no scientific way to test for drug impairment.

“There’s always ripple effects to everything,” he said.