Dealer gets last chance

WHITMAN — Vehicle dealer David Federico now faces a solid March 1 deadline to clean up the lot of his 575 Bedford St. Diesel Trucks business or face suspension of his Class II Auto Dealer’s License until he does.

The Board of Selectmen voted 4-1 Tuesday, Feb. 9 to support Building Inspector Robert Curran’s recommendation to grant the second extension. Selectmen Dan Salvucci vehemently disagreed.

“It’s been five weeks now,” Salvucci said. “I’ve seen a little improvement, but then you go back to your old ways. … I would think that you would do what we asked you to do and then come back [to request more vehicles]. You haven’t done that. It’s like pulling teeth for you to do what we’re asking you to do.”

Federico raised the board’s level of frustration by suggesting he should be permitted to store at least 52 vehicles on the lot and that they did not understand the nature of his business and were being unfair to him because he is not a Whitman resident.

“I’m working on an extremely tight margin here as profit goes,” Federico said after the vote. “I’m not from the area, I’m not from Whitman, I’m from Needham. Maybe I do feel I’m not being treated as fairly as another car dealer who’s from the area.”

Selectman Brian Bezanson agreed with Salvucci’s frustration and asked if the board wasn’t being more lenient with Federico than with other dealers in town.

“I believe we need to treat everybody the same in this category,” Bezanson said, but deferred to Curran’s judgment for now. “I don’t want the public to get the impression that we’re going the extra, extra mile.”

In January, Federico had been granted an extension to Feb. 9 after he had reduced the number of vehicles from 65 down to between 48 and 50 and created a handicapped parking space, but more issues — such as a car parked in the loading area — remained, bringing about the extension to Feb. 9. The board had ordered Federico to limit his inventory to 35, be open normal business hours and provide adequate customer and handicapped parking by Jan. 19 or risk revocation of his license.

Selectmen Chairman Carl Kowalski suggested endorsing Curran’s recommendation, while requiring a site plan and Curran’s oversight of the improvements.

“Mr. Federico ought to understand that March 1 is the dead deadline,” Kowalski said.

Curran now suggests 40 is a more realistic vehicle limit for the business and said he would continue working with Federico to develop the best layout for that number. He said March 1 is a workable deadline.

“He’s trying to keep the amount of vehicles to around 50 or a bit over that,” Curran said. “The issue here is, and I think I have to change my opinion a little bit, this gentleman is selling trucks — Diesel Trucks is the name of the business. I can’t go in there thinking I’m going to see cars for sale.”

He said Federico has a lot of older vehicles with diesel motors in them and said the motors are, more often than not, more valuable than the bodies and Federico markets mostly on the Internet.

“However, I still feel it’s over-crowded,” Curran said. “You should give him a little time to get rid of another 10 vehicles and then restrict him to 40 until he wants to re-address it.”

Inspections over the past week reveal the handicapped parking space is blocked again and the Federico still has the loading area blocked. Snow removal was also an issue.

“The vehicles at the rear of the property are kind of three or four deep and they seem to be backed up into the woods,” he said.

Federico brought in a plan he said took him eight hours to draw up, but Selectman Lisa Green noted there was no provision within it for the size difference between passenger cars and larger diesel vehicles and trucks.

“I don’t own the property,” Federico said, repeating several times his absentee landlord’s advice that he hire a lawyer. “My response to him was … ‘These guys seem like nice guys, I don’t think we need an attorney. I think we can go in and move some cars around here and get everything squared away.”

Federico suggested the property owner is ready to litigate against somebody.

Selectman Scott Lambiase and Assistant Town Administrator Greg Enos both reminded Federico the license is in his name, not in the property owner’s, and goes with Federico if he moves within town.

Whitman and Hanson libraries receive bequest

BROCKTON — Some people may, on occasion, consider taking a walk to their town’s public library — if the weather is nice and it’s not too far — but avid patron Bruno G. Guerra of Hanson thought nothing of walking as much as four miles through the woods to use a library.

The Brockton native used his research at three area libraries to build a healthy stock portfolio and, in his will, shared the dividends.

Brockton, Hanson and Whitman public libraries were each left more than $350,000 for capital projects. Guerra also left funds to Bentley College to endow a scholarship in honor of his wife Marjorie.

All three libraries will also post a memorial plaque to Guerra.

The libraries receiving bequests from Guerra’s estate co-hosted a reception program at the main branch of the Brockton Public Library Sunday afternoon as a thank you to his family.

“He loved the library,” said nephew Barry Guerra. “He loved to read and had a lot of passion for libraries and he had a lot of friends — he just loved to talk to people.”

The libraries loved him back as the advocate for the valuable services libraries continue to provide communities.

“It took a lot of self control on my part to tell nobody for like a year,” Brockton Library Trustees President Fred Howell said of the probate period. “We decided it would be really nice to have an event to memorialize Bruno’s gift to the library systems of Brockton, Hanson and Whitman and to bring his family here to recognize what a wonderful gift this was.”

Library directors were invited to talk about the benefits of the libraries to their communities.

“Libraries are a place that anybody can go to,” Howell said. “It’s just a huge opportunity and a place where you can grow personally.”

Two of Guerra’s friends — Corinne Cafardo of Hanson and Don Karp of Brockton — spoke fondly of their late friend.

“The [Hanson Library] Foundation is overwhelmed by the generous donation made by Bruno Guerra,” said Foundation member Cafardo, a neighbor of Guerra’s. She enjoyed conversations with him about libraries and books he liked to read.

Honoring a friend

After seeing him walking through Whitman one day, Cafardo asked Guerra where he was headed and he told her he often walked the two miles from his house on Holly Ridge Drive in Hanson to the Whitman Library. Agreeing that Whitman’s Library is an excellent facility within easy walking distance, Cafardo also told him about Hanson’s library.

“Then I found out he had walked four and a half miles to the Hanson Library through the woods,” she said. “I had a talk with him about walking through the woods. I didn’t want anything to happen to him. The next I heard, he was walking down Route 58.”

She then had to insist driving was safer.

Cafardo said Bruno believed in the value of public libraries as a means to connect people and foster friendships.

“I will always remember Bruno as a loveable neighbor and friend,” she said, choked with emotion.

Karp, for whose family business — Central Radio Stores — Guerra worked for some 50 years, related how Guerra worked to learn bookkeeping and became a tax preparer.

“His life was centered around the library,” Karp said. “He was a very modest man, not particularly materialistic, he drove old cars because they were imperfect.”

Libraries were Guerra’s Google search engine, he said. He used the library to research companies before making small investments.

“His life centered around the store, his friends, his nephews in particular and the library,” Karp said.

Plans for gift

Hanson Library Director Nancy Cappellini, said Guerra was a very humble man who  is helping enhance the facility. She said his bequest can help her library, built in 1991 and outgrown within four years, to expand.

“Libraries are busier than ever,” she said. “You can find any information you need … it’s a lifeline for most people.”

Whitman’s Assistant Library Director Marcie Walsh-O’Connor said the gift is greatly appreciated by a staff that is as dedicated to the community as Guerra was to libraries.

“It is truly a blessing to have staff and to have a community that cares,” she said, noting the gift will be used to enhance library technology. “Most people no longer have a desktop in their home anymore, so the ability to have brand-new computers in the library to assist them so that the staff can sit with them and show them how to use this lovely gift will be amazing.”

Brockton Library Board of Directors member Mark Lindy added that libraries treat all patrons alike.

“There are no barriers,” he said referring to a 1930s WPA mural on the third floor that calls libraries “the people’s university.”

Physical barriers to the city’s libraries were recently removed through renovations at the main and east branches and Guerra’s gift will be used to help renovate the west branch.

“People that need to seek jobs come here, people that need to learn about the stock market come here … and we’re just happy and pleased that we have all these folks here on a cold winter’s day to keep the library alive,” Lindy said.

Bob Buckley, chief of staff to Brockton Mayor Bill Carpenter concluded the program by presenting a citation of appreciation to members of Guerra’s family.

“Municipalities can’t survive without the generosity of people like Bruno Guerra,” he said. “Money is tight, as you all know, we’re battling for every dollar at the state, federal and local level and a gift like this is something that opens doors to people that would [otherwise] be closed forever.”