By MAUREEN DOHERTY
NORTH READING — A few big decisions await the townspeople next Monday and Tuesday evening as preparations get underway for the Special Town Meeting to be held Tuesday, January 30 at 7 p.m. in the high school gym.
The Special Town Meeting came about rather quickly once the Select Board was informed that the half-acre property with a single family house at 1 Central St., owned by Nancy and Charlie Wheeler, was going to be put on the market. The siblings are the children of the late Ed and Ellen Wheeler who had sold about five acres of their farmland abutting Ipswich River Park to the town for municipal purposes many years earlier when the park was being developed. Ed Wheeler farmed land throughout town, including cabbage fields behind the homes on Haverhill Street where the IRP playing fields are located today.
When the Wheelers opted to subdivide the lot that contained their old barn and sell it to the town they also ensured that their existing home would remain for their children for as long as they wanted to live in it, according to Rita Mullin, a long time member of both the Recreation Committee and the Land Utilization Committee. She knew the Wheelers and had firsthand knowledge of their desire for the town to purchase this land and she was it was offered at fair market value back then. She told the Transcript that the Wheelers had made their wishes known to their kids but acknowledged that they said the decision about whether to sell to the town would be theirs to make when the time came.
That time is now, according to Mullin, and in December, the Select Board and the Wheelers came to an agreement in principal and the Wheelers accepted the town’s offer of $650,000 for the land and the house, which is much less than they could sell it for on the open market in the current economy.
If the purchase and sale is to move forward, it must be done by a two-thirds vote of the town’s voters at a Special Town Meeting, at which a minimum of 150 voters must be present. Under the terms of the agreement with the Wheelers, the sale needs to be finalized by Feb. 15.
It is up to the voters to authorize and appropriate the funding for the purchase or to decline to do so.
According to Town Administrator Michael Gilleberto, the town does have funds available to make such a purchase “and is anticipated to be funded using available funds without the need for a debt exclusion or override.”
To provide the voters with as much information as possible on how the purchase would be financed and the potential uses for the land, the Select Board is also holding an Informational Hearing on this warrant article on Monday night, Jan. 29 at 8 p.m.
Residents of town are invited to ask questions of the board at the informational meeting, which is being held both in-person in Room 14 at Town Hall, 235 North St. and virtually via Zoom (link is posted on the town website at www.northreadingma.gov).
Questions may also be addressed to the board members during the Special Town Meeting. The town reminds residents that the actual Special Town Meeting can only be held in person due to the nature of the town’s Open Town Meeting format which does not provide a means to record votes remotely (and they’d be no way of verifying who was placing said vote when done from home).
For those with mobility issues, additional handicap accessible parking spaces will be made available at the main entrance to NRHS during the Special Town Meeting. The town will also provide a wheelchair at the main entrance and the gym-side entrance to the school to assist in getting voters to their seats.
It is also being stressed that wastewater is not being discussed at this Special Town Meeting. A meeting later in the spring, which has not been scheduled yet, would be called for that purpose.
There are only two other articles on the Jan. 30 warrant. Article 2 would deal with adjustments to the FY24 operating budget, although no changes were anticipated as being needed at press time.
Article 3 concerning the FY24 capital budget has three anticipated amendments: authorizing supplemental funding for continued design development for the fire station renovation project/Owners Project Manager ($250,000) using Free Cash, safety improvements to the intersection of North and Central Streets ($183,000) using Free Cash, and water tank re-painting at Swan Pond ($515,000 using retained earnings from the Water Enterprise and/or Infrastructure Stabilization Fund).