Swampscott meeting removes article to fund police station

SWAMPSCOTT – Whether to fund the design of a new police station is not something Town Meeting will be allowed to decide at the annual Town Meeting next month.At its meeting Tuesday evening the selectmen did something that has not been done in recent years. It voted unanimously to remove an article from the Town Meeting warrant.The article, which was recommended by the Capital Improvement Committee, would have allowed Town Meeting to vote on whether to borrow money to fund the design of a new police station.Despite the recommendation of the Capital Improvement Committee, the selectmen voted unanimously to pull the article from the warrant so Town Meeting would not be allowed to vote on whether to appropriate funds for the design of the station.Selectman Anthony Scibelli said now is not the right time to ask the town to borrow money to build a new station. Scibelli said the selectmen should show leadership by not allowing the article to be placed on the warrant because it cannot afford to borrow money for the project.”We have to exercise discretion,” he said.Selectman Adam Forman agreed placing the article on the warrant would be a “bad idea.”He pointed out this is the first time in the three years he has served as a selectmen that an article has been removed from the warrant by the selectmen.Town Administrator Andrew Maylor said he believes it is important to have a public dialogue regarding funding the design of the station. He said the selectmen could make their opposition to the article clear but he believes it should go before Town Meeting.At a Board of Selectmen meeting in February the Capital Improvement Committee told the selectmen a new police station is needed and the committee recommended asking Town Meeting to approve borrowing money for the design.At that time, Capital Improvements Committee Chairman Cindy Merkle said the committee has looked at funding requests from the police department for capital improvements for the existing facility and looked at previous studies, some of which date back to 1997, for a new station. She said the committee decided it is in the best interest of the town to go forward with the design process to build a new police station at the town owned pumping station on Humphrey Street. The committee said it would cost approximately $6.5 million to build a new station and it recommended borrowing $450,000 to design the new station.