Marblehead boards get late start on campaign to promote overrides

MARBLEHEAD – When they met Tuesday night the Board of Health and Solid Waste Facility Committee were already one week behind in the race to seek support for their two override questions.Twenty days from now, voters will decide whether to fund a one-time capital exclusion of $656,000 to monitor contamination from the old town landfill in neighborhood soil and water and a 20-year bond issue of $18.1 million to cap the former town landfill, build a new solid waste building and purchase or take property in need of clean-up from landfill contamination.In a public meeting Tuesday the two committees decided that the Solid Waste Facility Committee will establish itself as a ballot committee to support the two proposals with fliers, a TV appearance, newspaper ads and letters, signs and other publicity. The committee will have to file paperwork with the town clerk to start their work.However, opponents of those two debt exclusion proposals and the two others, the $668,000 to make the Old Town House handicapped accessible and the $25.4 million new Glover School, began raising funds for their anti-override campaign May 18, a week ago.A four-page email sent out by Marblehead Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility, obtained by a health department employee and shared with The Item, announced that "The Overrides Are Back!" and listed their effect on the annual tax bills for 12 categories of homes, ranging from $300,000 to $6 million.According to the town website, the owner of a median $483,000 home is paying $4,931 in taxes this year. If all four questions pass, they will add $364.40 to the tax bill for a median home next year and $237.33 to each year’s tax rate for 19 years after that.The flier also claimed that those working in favor of the overrides are "extremely well-funded and well-organized," and called town officials’ statements that the state will fine Marblehead for not capping the landfill "a scare tactic.""People want some assurance that we will be fined," said Selectman Judy Jacobi, who attended Tuesday’s meeting as a guest."If the state does fine us, those fines run until we complete the job. They don’t stop when we vote to spend the money," said Director of Public Health Wayne Attridge. He noted that override opponents haven’t changed their message from last year, when they defeated 10 override questions."It costs us more money not to do this than to do it," said Solid Waste Committee Chairman Matt Herring. "We’ve got that message. I don’t think the message is that complicated. We just need to get it out."