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To the Citizens of Ashburnham:
Another year brings quite a number of changes in Ashburnham. We started out the year 2005 saying goodbye to our hard working Town Administrator Katie Nunez and filling the void that she left with Interim Town Administrator Norman Thidemann. Norman did an excellent job of keeping the Town moving forward while we searched for a new Town Administrator. Our thanks go out to Norman for seeing us through another tough budget season and for helping us deal with difficult times in the police department.
With Norman's help and guidance, a balanced FY 2006 budget was presented to the Town, adding several long needed positions to the budget. We were able to add another full time firefighter to the fire department, another full time police officer to the police department and we created another Sergeant position in the police department. We are proud to say that our new Sergeant's position was filled from within: Officer Todd Parsons was elevated to the rank of Sergeant after performing well on a battery of tests and interviews. Sergeant Parsons joins Sergeant Robert Brennan as a shift supervisor for the department.
In addition to the other new positions added to the budget, we were also able to fulfill a long term goal of hiring a Town Planner to help Ashburnham with land use planning for the future. Eric Smith was hired as our Town Planner and has already accomplished great things for our town and has helped us plan for the future. We should also recognize the members of the Town Planner Search Committee who should be credited with recognizing that Eric Smith would be such a good fit with our community. They are: John MacMillan, Richard Wright, Robert MacLeod, Lorraine Desouza, David Perry, Janet Dolder, Joseph VonDeck and Joseph Kalagher.
After an extensive search, we also welcomed Kevin Paicos to the Town of Ashburnham as our new Town Administrator. Kevin brings a great deal of experience to the position of Town Administrator, having served more than 17 years as Town Administrator for the Town of Easton, Massachusetts. Kevin's impact on our town has already been strongly felt by the many projects that he has tackled on our behalf. We thank him for all that he has already done for our town, and we will be sure to see many more accomplishments from him in years to come. We also express our heartfelt thanks to the members of the Town Administrator Search Committee who spent many volunteer hours reviewing resumes and developing and attending candidate interviews. The committee members were Selectman Jonathan Dennehy, Donna Burton, Maggie Whitney,
Denise Popko, Matt Olivari, Gail Dumont and Chief Paul Zbikowski.
In 2005, we also welcomed our new Chief of Police, Loring Barrett, Jr. Larry comes to us from the Town of Hubbardston, where he had been Chief for several years. Chief Barrett was the successful candidate resulting from an exhaustive and extensive screening process, the likes of which our town has never before seen. Larry has had a positive impact upon the department and our community, bringing quiet strength, wisdom and leadership to his position as Chief. We offer our deepest thanks to the members of the Police Chief Search Committee for doing such a great job in finding such a well qualified police chief! They include: Bill Webber, Chair, Edward Vitone, Matthew Christensen, Bill Cooper, Joe Olivari, Sallie Thoma, Rachel Fowler, Nick Dalton and Steve Unsworth of BadgeQuest.
While we have accomplished a number of important tasks on behalf of the town, there exist several long term projects that we will be devoting our time to over the next year.
During 2005, the Ashburnham-Westminster Regional School District formed the John R. Briggs School Study Committee, which was tasked with studying the current condition of our elementary school, the needs of the school heading into the future, and the thoughts and ideas of the citizenry of Ashburnham as they relate to whether we should renovate or replace Briggs school. This committee, led by David Christianson, Jr. and Superintendent of Schools Dr. Michael Zapantis met many times to meet its goals. The committee has concluded that though state of the art when built in the late 1960s, John R. Briggs School no longer meets the needs of the school district. The building is overcrowded and inefficient. Although the work of the Study Committee is virtually complete, it is now going to be the task of a building committee to
decide whether to renovate or replace this building so that the Town's elementary school needs are met now and into the future. Our thanks to the members of this committee: AWRSD School Committee Chairman David Christianson, Jr., AWRSD Superintendent Dr. Michael Zapantis, Selectman Jonathan Dennehy, AWRSD School Committee Member Christopher Gagnon, AWRSD School Committee Member Keith Glenny, Ashburnham Advisory Board member Ed Tree, Ashburnham Business Council President Alan Couturier, Briggs Principal Candace Wright, Extended Day Program Leader Dorene Francis, Pastor Dale Proulx, Paul Engman, Mary Gagnon, Michelle Gianino and Bob Salo.
We are also faced with the ongoing project of building a Public Safety Building. Although spending the last two years studying the needs of the Police, Fire and EMT departments and trying to design a building program to fit those needs, the Building Committee was chagrinned to find that the bid proposal came in some $2.6 Million over budget. The project suffered two failed ballot votes seeking the approval from the town for the budget increase. In the midst of this failure, we are still encouraged by the fact that we have the May 2004 vote by the town to spend $6.5 million on the project, and now we must build a Public Safety Building for the money that has already been appropriated at town meeting and at the ballot box in 2004. Fitting the needs of the community within the budget allocated will be a challenge, but we
are determined to move forward to build a building that will serve our community. Our thanks go out to the members of the PSB committee: Selectman Mark Carlisle, Glenn Hathaway, Chief Paul Zbikowski, Chief Larry Barrett, Officer Rob Siano, and Ellen Holmes.
We also face challenges going forward in relocating our Highway Department and renovating the Town Hall as well. The members of the Focus Group will be tasked with studying the relocation of the Highway Department, and their members include: Robert Fichtel, Chair, Gil Carreiro, Richard DiPaoli, Janet Dolder, Geoffrey Evancic, Pat Frederick, Chris Gagnon, Christina Sargent and Sallie Thoma. The members of the Town Hall Renovation Committee will be tasked with renovating our wonderfully historic Fairbanks Memorial Town Hall. Their task is a difficult one: increasing the work space in the building, adding modern access and convenience to the town hall, while still preserving the historical features of the building that we all know and love. They include: David Sargent, Chair, Michael Gallant, Wes Landry, Ron Reed, Leo
Collette, Tim Dumont, Jim Whidden, Mary Coswell and Christina Sargent.
Among other challenges that we face this coming year: beginning and completing the project of installing a water line down Fitchburg Road to alleviate the neighborhood's well contamination issue; working with City of Gardner to improve and perhaps expand our current arrangement with Gardner to provide municipal sewer to parts of our town; and to work with the other town boards and committees to plan for and regulate development growth in Ashburnham.
Although we have made an effort in our report to recognize the many volunteers that have contributed their time, effort, money and ideas to the effort of making our town a better place, we have merely scratched the surface of the number of volunteers that serve our town. We are immensely grateful to all the volunteers that have come forward to serve the Town of Ashburnham, and encourage any and all residents to join us in the fulfilling job of being part of the volunteer community that makes the Town of Ashburnham a truly unique and special place to live.
In this regard, we wish to extend special thanks to all of the service that our fellow Selectman, Ronald Reed has given to the Town of Ashburnham. Although Ron is leaving the Board of Selectmen this year after 12 consecutive years of service to our Board (and more than 20 consecutive years total, when taking into account his service on the Advisory Board and the AWRSD School Committee) he has promised to remain active in town, serving on the Town Hall Renovation Committee. In a community of volunteers, Ron's dedication, knowledge and passion for our town is an inspiration to the rest of us, and his guidance will be sorely missed on the Board of Selectmen. Ron has guided us through good times and bad, and always with a sense of humility and a sense of humor. Thank you Ron, for all that you have done for us.
We also wish to thank all of the employees of the Town of Ashburnham for their hard work to make Ashburnham a great place to live. Our special thanks go to Sylvia Turcotte, who has worked so hard for us despite the turmoil of having three different Town Administrators to work with in the course of this past year! Sylvia is an expert in (among other things) keeping us organized, chasing us for signatures and generally making us look good. We thank Sylvia for her hard work, loyalty and dedication to the Town of Ashburnham.
As always, the Board pledges to continue to work hard to serve our citizens in providing town services at the most reasonable cost available and to provide vision and leadership in the best way possible. We are honored and proud to serve as your Selectmen.
Respectfully submitted,
Jonathan M. Dennehy, Chairman
Mark H. Carlisle, Clerk
Ronald W. Reed, Member
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