Town Notes
Published on August 1st, 2001
STONEHAM, MA - Power outages
NStar Energy, the electric utility provider for Stoneham cannot explain why one neighborhood including the intersection of Hancock and Franklin Streets and stretching toward the High School seems to lose power more often than the rest of town.
“There were the booming thunder storms on June 30th and one of four supply lines between Arlington and Woburn was out on July 25th, but we haven’t had any other reports,” said Michael Monahan of NStar public relations.
But Kathy Hannigan of Hancock Street said she called about other outages, most recently a two hour outage on July 17.
“I called one number and was told to call the engineer for this area, a Stephen Wasylak, but he never returned my calls,” Hannigan said.
Don Hutcheson of Hancock Street relies on an electric powered oxygen machine to breath. When he loses power he has a reserve tank, but with multiple outages close together the tank was low on July 25 when he lost power. When he called an emergency number, he got a recorded message.
“I’m on the emergency list, but 911 is faster,” Hutcheson said.
Monahan said that NStar wants to find out what’s going on in Hannigan and Hutcheson’s neighborhood, but it may take some time and cooperation.
“We need people to call us every time there’s an outage,” Monahan said. “We only got a low voltage report for July 17. No reports of an outage.”
“I tried to call, but I got a machine,” Hannigan said.
So goes the battle.
Cross walk safety
The town of Stoneham is leading the way behind Town Clerk John Hanright to make cross walks more visible to motorists and safer for pedestrians.
Hanright has written to the State Legislature. His goal is to make cross walks more visible and uniformly so throughout the state.
The town is in the process of painting all cross walks on town owned streets blue.
Hanright began his campaign after losing his sister, Mary Ellen Beagen, to an accident in a cross walk in Littleton.
VFW building not ugly
The two story building site plan from John Macone and John Gardner that Selectmen approved for the old VFW site at 89 Hancock St. shows a residential building.
The plans show a slanted roof with dormers and siding. But the space will be used for businesses — Gardner Electrical and Powderhouse Plumbing — and storage. After debate at the July 24 meeting, the owners agreed to include a sprinkler system, the Selectmen’s only concern, and that was that.
MWRA nice guy
James Robertson went above and beyond the call of duty, rushing to the aid of an elderly woman in distress.
The woman was walking with her husband on a hot day last week. She passed out in front of Friendly’s and her husband called out for help. James Robertson, an MWRA public relations employee, was at the Main and South Street work site, and he responded to the man’s cry for help.
Robertson carried the woman into Friendly’s and got the attention of a manager to get water for the woman.
“Everything worked out fine, and we just wanted to say thank you,” the husband said. The couple asked to remain anonymous.
So there may be a few traffic jams, but at least our state workers are looking out for us. Now that’s public relations.
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