SAUGUS — The town will request the Saugus River floodgate project be restarted decades after being deauthorized, with town meeting members voting to petition the governor to jumpstart the project and build anti-flood infrastructure along at the mouth of the river.
Monday night’s Special Town Meeting warrant consisted of 28 articles, and the meeting was held virtually on the online video-conferencing service Zoom. At the beginning of the meeting, Finance Committee Chairman Kenneth DePatto said the COVID-19 pandemic necessitates that the town approach financial matters with “caution.”
“We the committee feel strongly that we should not spend money unless it’s an emergency or it’s necessary,” DePatto said.
Article 5 — taken out of order and debated first — passed. The article compels the town to request the state restart the Saugus River floodgate project, which was proposed and authorized in the late 1980s, but was tabled in 1993. The project asks for “floodgates” to be installed at the mouth of the river, infrastructure that would prevent flooding when water levels surge.
Town meeting member Peter Manoogian introduced the article, saying rising sea levels and global warming make the floodgate project more necessary than when it was first proposed. He also said homeowners along the riverfront are beleaguered by expensive flood insurance.
“The flooding is worse,” Manoogian said. “The flooding we’re starting to see and have been seeing is truly an existential threat for the people living along the river.”
At the newspaper’s deadline, 26 articles had not yet been voted upon.
The remaining articles included include one asking the town to adopt a policy allowing any town meeting member to propose a nonbinding resolution as a warrant article by giving a written or election proposal to the town clerk with at least 48 hours notice; an article to disallow members of the select board, school committee, finance committee, or town meeting from holding a paid town office until at least one year after serving on their respective board or committee; an article to have a feasibility study look at potential locations for a new fire station on Route 1; articles asking for studies on town employees’ classification and compensation; and an article asking town meeting members to create a study committee to examine the Ballard School building for potential usage as veterans’ housing or something else that receives state or federal funds.
Look for complete results from the Special Town Meeting in Wednesday’s issue of The Item and online at www.itemlive.com.
