LYNNFIELD — The Select Board made changes to the town’s trash-collection policy during its meeting Monday, ratifying a three-barrel limit per household during normal weekly trash collection.
The original proposal presented to the board was to lower the town’s current limit of seven barrels to five.
“Our goal is for people to increase recycling and decrease trash,” Town Administrator Robert Dolan said.
Dolan said he would not recommend measures like fees for extra bags, barrels, or trash collection, moves he said are popular options with some municipalities, due to the administrative difficulty of doing so.
Vice Chair Richard Dalton initially said he didn’t understand the point of the change, given that there would be no enforcement if the limit was surpassed.
“There’s no economic benefit and I don’t know why we would implement a policy that has no economic benefit, and secondly has no environmental benefit,” Dalton said. “People are still going to be putting out trash… I keep on looking for the benefit for the town.”
Lynnfield Public Works Director John Tomasz, one of the proponents of the policy change, said the town would save a small amount of money by processing more recycling in the place of trash. He also noted there was an environmental benefit to incentivize recycling, which the policy does not limit.
“It’s better to recycle things than it is to burn things or bury things,” Tomasz said.
Tomasz said the policy would affect very few people in town, as a town survey of 1,600 people showed 96% of people put out four or fewer barrels for trash collection. He also said many other towns in the area have lower limits than the five-barrel proposal.
According to Tomasz, the effort would be party cosmetic, allowing the town’s policies to look more environmentally friendly when applying for grant funding.
“The one thing they don’t want to see is Lynnfield leading the state in how many barrels they allow to be put out,” Tomasz said. “It sets a bad tone.… It doesn’t help me get money from the state for anything that has to do with recycling.”
Tomasz added that enforcement would only take place in extreme circumstances and not during special occasions, like around Christmas.
After hearing Tomasz’s explanation, Dalton suggested that the policy’s limit be lowered to three barrels instead of five.
“At this point, if four is an outlier we might as well go to three,” Dalton said. “I think three makes so much more sense if we’re going to do anything at all.”
The board voted unanimously to implement the three-barrel limit for weekly trash collection, which will be effective Sept. 1.
The board also voted to move a recycling container inside the Recycling Yard fence at Town Hall in an effort to prevent issues of overuse and dumping.
Select Board Chair Joe Connell also laid out the board’s goals for 2023-24.
Connell said that the town is planning to complete the war memorial by the end of 2024, and added that he expects it to hit funding goals to make that possible.
Continuation of the town’s road-improvement program was another point Connell said was important to the board, as more than $900,000 in estimated funds have been planned for continued resurfacing and reconstruction projects led by Tomasz.
“Under John’s supervision what we did last year was amazing, so we gave him more money to get more done this year,” Connell said.
Connell also said police-contract negotiations are ongoing.
He outlined completion of maintenance and repair work on Lynnfield High School’s tennis courts and football stadium as other goals.
The board made two appointments during the meeting.
Assistant Treasurer Rose Kenney was appointed as the interim treasurer/collector after Leslie Davidson, who had served as treasurer since 2019, announced that she would leave Lynnfield to become Belmont’s treasurer in late June.
Kenney is set to step into the role of interim treasurer on June 26 while the town searches for Davidson’s replacement.
The board also appointed Lynnfield Housing Authority Chair Jim Wilkie to the L.I.F.E. Inc. Board of Directors. Wilkie has served as Lynnfield Housing Authority chair since 2019, having previously served as public housing administrator in Saugus for nearly 20 years.
