Saugus citizen’s forum makes return

SAUGUS – The Board of Selectmen stepped up to the plate Tuesday and voted unanimously to reinstate the citizen’s forum into the regular agenda.Chairman Donald Wong apologized to the community and took full responsibility for the removal of the forum last November. Board members Stephen Castinetti remained silent and Peter Rossetti only spoke to make the motion to reinstate the agenda item. Both Castinetti and Rossetti stood solidly behind Wong during the last six months of controversy over the issue.The public had spoken out against the loss of citizen’s forum from the start and the issue came to a head when Selectman Michael Kelleher brought it to the floor of Town Meeting asking meeting members to make it a bylaw.After a discussion with Town Moderator Robert Long, Wong asked Town Meeting to set the article aside and allow the board to clean up its own house.Wong said Tuesday he would like to thank Rossetti and Castinetti and the residents who supported him when he took the forum off the agenda. He said in reinstating the forum he hopes to reunite the board and the residents for the betterment of the town.”It’s now time to come together to solve the many problems facing Saugus,” he said. “Again, it was my best intention but after hearing the residents of Saugus I now think this is the best thing to do. I hope you understand that I will always have the best interest for Saugus in my heart.”Selectman Stephen Horlick said he would ask that the citizen’s forum be reinstated in an unrestricted fashion but Kelleher said he believed Rossetti’s motion to simply reinstate the forum to its previous state covered all the necessary bases.”I don’t hear anyone putting restrictions on it,” he said.Both Horlick and Kelleher thanked Wong for his change of heart. Kelleher called the issue a distraction and Wong’s request to reinstate the forum a good move.Horlick said he was happy that residents would now be able to discuss any issue with the board and also that the board could now focus its attention on more important affairs.Resident Janice Jarosz, who argued for the reinstatement regularly, said she planned to be the first to speak during the reinstated forum, which she thought was quite fitting.