Your Guide to Town Meeting

Marblehead residents will get to vote on a wide range of issues at Monday night, scheduled to begin at the Performing Arts Center for the Veterans Middle School at 7:30 p.m. The articles before the town feature some old fights and a couple of new ones.

They include several passionate fights that provide for rebuilding the , and building a , restoring the use of the old Town Hall, changing how future police chiefs will be selected and deciding if one resident can keep his house from being torn down.

Three issues involve spending millions of taxpayers' money that will have to be approved first by the Town Meeting and then face an override vote. Two of the largest expenditures – the landfill and the school – are repeats from last year when they passed the Town Meeting vote, only to be

All are politically charged. Proponents of the spending measures argue that each is essential and must go forward now. Opponents agreed that some of the projects are worthwhile, but question whether the town can afford to spend significant amounts of money when the economy is still struggling.

The opposition is led by a group, the Not Now We Are In A Recession Ballot Committee, which orchestrated the defeat of all

Since then two of the major projects have been scaled back, saving the town several million dollars. Jack Buba, the treasurer for the committee, refused to claim victory and not oppose the less expensive version of the landfill and the school again this year.

“This is all about affordability,” he said.

Finance Committee Chairman David Harris said he believes the opposition served the taxpayers well in delaying several projects and reducing the costs of other projects.

“Millions of dollars in projects that were on last year's Town Warrant are not here,” Harris said.

Projects like capping the landfill and building the school have to be done, he said.

Town Meetings tend to be lengthy with the hotly contested issues held to the end following a long list of routine questions that will be presented to the residents.

Here is an analysis of the more hotly contested issues that will be heard at the meeting. The full list of articles can be found on the town's web site.

New Glover School

To vote on rebuilding the , town residents will have to wait until the end of the meeting. Article 39, which will be the last article to be considered this year, calls for building the new school for students in kindergarten through third grade. It would accommodate 425 students. The would be closed.

The article would authorize the expenditure of $25.9 million for the new school. But that is misleading.

That would leave the town to raise the balance of $15.7 million through bond sales.

The school building committee cut almost $2 million off the estimated costs that went to the Town Meeting last year. The savings were achieved with several design changes and relocating where the proposed school would sit on the site.

The driving force is availability of the state funding. School Committee member Patricia Blackmer told the finance committee recently, “If the funding is not approved this spring, we will go to the back of the line.”

Zaxaro Bennett, a mother of a Glover School student, urged the committee to approve the funding for the new school. She said one morning this winter the old boiler at the school was not working and the temperature inside the school building was 45 degrees. “We can't wait until we have an emergency,” she said.

Opponents agree that the school may need to be rebuilt, but they question whether the town can afford to build the school now.

Old Townhouse Renovations

Article 28 would authorize spending $667,793 to. The renovations would install an elevator between floors and make other changes to make the building more accessible.

The Town House is currently “mothballed,” said Board of Selectmen Chairman Jim Nye because it is not accessible to all.

The historic building,

Jack Buba said he believes that he and others can get the Town House renovated with private donations of money, supplies and labor. He proposed that the town postpone spending taxpayer money on the Town House for a year to allow for the private fundraising effort.

Three members of the Board of Selectmen said if the funding is approved for the Town House, work would not start until the fall. They said they would accept any donations toward renovating the historic Town House.

 Capping the Landfill and Building a New Transfer Station

Articles 32 through 35 involve the

The proposal is to approve spending $15.1 million to cap the landfill and replace the 54-year-old trash transfer station. That is about $7 million less than what was proposed last year.

Following the the Board of Health appointed a committee composed of architects, builders, developers and attorneys to review the plans the plans and find a way to reduce the costs. Using two engineering firms, the Transfer Station Building Committee redesigned the project that was described by Health Director Wayne Attridge as a “fully equipped pickup truck” as opposed to a Cadillac that had been proposed.

Proponents say the landfill has to be capped or the state Department of Environmental Protection may start to levy heavy fines against the town. The fines could be $600,000 the first year and $720,000 a year after that.

Opponents say the proponents are using the DEP fines as a reason to force the town to raise the money for the transfer station and landfill now. They dispute that DEP is poised to start levying fines against Marblehead.

Again they do not oppose the project as much as oppose doing it right now.

Stony Brook Road Cleanup

The town has negotiated settlements with all but one of the property owners at 52, 55 and 56 Stony Brook Road. Article 34 asks for approval of $1.8 million to purchase or remediate portions of these properties. Article 35 asks for approval of $1.25 million to acquire and clean up 57 Stony Brook Road.

 Property Zoning Changes

One of the thorniest issues that will face Town Meeting this year stems from a decades-old fight over at 94 Bubier Road. Two articles, 36 and 37, deal with lot widths and how they are measured.

Article 37 would reduce the width requirement from 100 feet to 75 feet. Article 36 would change the requirement that the frontyard of a house need have to be only 75 percent of the width requirement. Johnson's house would comply under either article.

The Planning Board will meet prior to Town Meeting to discuss the issue once more.

The battle over Johnson's house started in 1995, when Drs. Ruth and John Schey, Lynnfield pediatricians, challenged Johnson's home construction. Johnson owned the adjacent house on Bubier Road, which was closer to the ocean. He subdivided the large lot to allow him to build a house on the new lot where a garage stood. He designed the new house and promised the new owners of his old house that he would build that house and not leave them with the uncertainty of what would be built there. He said he felt committed to building the new house as he had designed it.

The Building Inspector gave Johnson a permit to build the house, but at a hearing the Zoning Board of Appeals denied his right to build that house because it did not meet the lot width requirement.

“I never intended to be a precedent setter,” Johnson said in an interview. Facing an uncertain future for his residence“is no way to live your life.” He said, “As far as I am concerned, the legal system has let me down.”

Opponents of the change fear that reducing the lot width will open the door to developers and land owners to subdivide lots and build more houses on narrower lots and thus increase the density of the town's housing.

The Committee for Common Sense Zoning, a group formed to support Johnson in his fight to save his home, told the planning board that more than 400 homes in Marblehead do not conform with the lot size and shape requirements. If the rule were changed to 75 feet, the lots would comply.

Non-conforming houses have to petition the zoning board if they want to make almost any change to the house. Proponents of the change say it is expensive and time consuming to win the zoning board's approval.

Charles Le Ray, Johnson's attorney, said changing the current 100-foot frontage rule would “make the zoning code mesh with the reality of what's on the ground in Marblehead.”

Opponents say the zoning board approves most requests, and one speaker called the process of winning the board's approval only “a bump in the road.”

Police Chief Removed from Civil Service

As a result of a recent independent review of the Police Department, Article 31 proposes to remove the position of the Chief of Police from the civil service protection. Future police chiefs would be hired for three-year terms operating under a contract with the town.

The change would give the Board of Selectmen more flexibility in hiring and firing future police chiefs.

Non-Smoking Devereaux Beach

 Article 29 would prohibit smoking on the popular beach.