SAUGUS — The town will name the athletic complex at the new middle-high school after longtime hockey coach and student mentor Christie Serino Jr. following a unanimous vote at Monday night’s annual Town Meeting.
“We feel that this is a tremendous honor to name the complex after Christie Serino Jr. for all the tremendous achievements, not only that he accomplished himself, but more importantly for what he’s done for our town and so many lives that he’s touched over the years,” said School Committee member John Hatch. “I think that Christie is the epitome of what truly it is to be a Saugus Sachem, and naming the sports complex after him is a fitting honor.”
The Board of Selectmen voted unanimously to support the name change at a meeting last month.
Serino, a Saugus native, was a former three-sport athlete and an inductee into the Saugus High School Athletic Hall of Fame. He taught English at Belmonte Middle School and physical education at Saugus High School, and served as the head hockey coach for the Sachems from 1980 to 1987, during which the team won three Northeastern Conference titles and was awarded Eastern Massachusetts Coach of the Year.
Serino coached baseball at the University of New Hampshire from 1994 to 1996 and hockey at Merrimack College from 1999 to 2005. He served as the athletic director and hockey coach for Malden Catholic until his death from cancer in October 2012.
Matt Serino, Christie Serino’s son, noted his father’s generosity, saying that he had helped numerous Saugus residents get into college or find jobs, whether they were an athlete or not.
“As an educator, as a coach and a person who loved Saugus, my father gave back everything he could to the town that gave him everything,” Serino said. “It didn’t matter if you were an athlete or in the performing arts. He was there to lend a helping hand.”
In addition, the town voted unanimously to instruct Town Counsel to investigate the potential creation of a fund that would allow developers to voluntarily contribute toward town projects. The program would be similar to Boston’s linkage program, which charges developers a fee which then funds the creation of affordable housing.
Town Meeting member Peter Rossetti, Jr., who submitted the warrant article, explained that the idea originally came from a recent project by the YMCA, where the town suggested the YMCA extend its sidewalk for the benefit of the town, but the proposal was obstructed by a significant amount of ledge that would have had to be removed. While the YMCA could not have paid for this, they were able to contribute to a fund for the project to be completed when enough funding had been acquired.
Rossetti explained that other local developers had also expressed willingness to contribute to a similar fund, but there was no method of doing so.
Town Counsel will investigate the idea and come up with language to create the fund, which will then have to be approved again by another Town Meeting and possibly by the state legislature.
The Town Meeting was significantly shorter than expected, as town officials decided last week to remove all the financial articles from the warrant because the Finance Committee had not provided recommendations.
Town Meeting members will meet again on Monday, May 10 to discuss some of the financial articles, provided the Finance Committee is able to discuss them and make recommendations before then.
