DeGeorge article defeated by concerned voters
Published on May 7th, 2003
STONEHAM, MA - Town residents and officials discussed three land-related articles during last night's scheduled special town meeting and voted to pass two of the three measures.
Specifically, citizens voted to postpone discussion on an article that would allow commercial zoning at the Old Central School and passed another article that proposed transferring school owned land to the town. The meeting's participants also approved an article that allows for the appropriation of $4,500 to the town so it can try to identify "odd lots" throughout Stoneham that could be sold to raise additional revenue.
School officials proposed rezoning the Old Central School weeks ago because they had met limited success in finding businesses interested in leasing the property. Saying that allowing for commercial zoning would probably increase the number of interested parties, officials had added article one to the warrant.
However, after discussing the feasibility of rezoning the school with the town's planning board, school officials decided to abandon the proposition, claiming that the article would make it difficult to reuse the building for school purposes if the need arose.
"I'd like to move that article one be indefinitely postponed," said school committee chairman Daniel Moynihan. "We did go to the planning board and they had a discussion about the wording of the article...if there's ever a need to reuse this building for the school, it would have to go again before the planning board," he explained.
Yet another revenue raising measure, Article two proposed transferring a 13,500 square foot lot located adjacent to the Stoneham High School's main driveway from school to town ownership. Although the town's selectmen, school committee, and finance and advisory board all endorsed the warrant article, the measure did meet some resistance by citizens wary of a large-scale development near the high school.
"We'd be losing the aesthetics...the air, the trees, the grass...I think there are other factors in the budget we could look at. We should preserve the open space and have a nice environment around the high school," said Carol Feke of 25 Oak St.
Others expressed concern with Article two because they feared a non-profit organization could buy the land, resulting in an annual loss of tax dollars. One such person, Eddy Previdi asked the gathering if they should consider including an amendment that would prohibit such an organization from purchasing the property. However, town counsel Bill Solomon questioned the legality of such a provision.
"I think there would be some questions raised about not selling it to a non-profit organization," warned Solomon. "A municipality or government can discriminate as long as it's rational...and as long as it's not against a particular group. If I was to use my legal sense, I would say it would probably pass a legal test," he explained.
Saying that he agreed with the essential message of the article, Stoneham resident John DeGeorge appealed to the crowd to remove language that would return the land back to the school within two years, if the town hadn't acted on selling the property.
"The school just said they don't need the property. Let's take the property. We'll take it and the board will decide what they're going to do with it. I would like to get rid of that two year limit and leave it in the hands of the selectmen," said DeGeorge.
However, DeGeorge's amendment met stiff resistance from town selectman Cosmo Ciccarello, who strongly cautioned the crowd to stop dividing the town departments from the school department.
"What this [amendment] is doing is splitting the municipal side from the school side. We're one town," shouted Ciccarello.
Moynihan also spoke on the amendment, telling the crowd that the school intended to give the property to the town as an expression of the "one town, one problem" philosophy the two departments adopted when tackling the current budget crisis.
"I just want to clarify that we are one town. We the school committee are trying to work with the board of selectmen and that's the purpose of this article," said Moynihan. "We're not saying we don't want land. We want land. We just didn't need it for any purpose right now," Moynihan added, before those gathered rejected DeGeorge's amendment and voted to pass the original article.
Not only did DeGeorge's suggestions meet opposition at the special town meeting, his warrant article was also later shot down after the regular town meeting resumed. Specifically, article seven proposed giving a real-estate tax break to senior citizens in Stoneham aged 70 and over who live in a single family home, a condominium unit, or a town house. According to DeGeorge, persons aged under 70 years of age who were disabled would also be eligible.
However, several citizens took issue with the article, which would benefit all types of senior citizens, not just those who can't afford rising tax rates.
"Just because you're lucky enough to live to 70 does not mean you should get a tax break. It should be based on financial need," argued Stoneham resident Kathy Sullivan. "Financially, we are better off now because our children are grown and we don't have the burden of raising them," she added.
Echoing statements similar to Sullivan, finance and advisory board member Peter D'Angelo said that while he understood the need for some sort of financial relief for seniors, such a break should be administered in a better way.
"We ought to be providing relief to our seniors in a structured, orderly way...Should anybody get a discount? A millionaire? I don't think so... From an economical and financial standpoint, that's poor practice," said D'Angelo.
Although no concrete numbers were developed to determine the exact cost of article seven, the finance and advisory board had estimated that it could cost the people of Stoneham $1.5 million.
However, DeGeorge takes issues with those figures, saying that when he first proposed the article, the board of selectmen told him that the numbers couldn't be determined.
"We should expect information in the book that's reliable and in my opinion, it's not," said DeGeorge of the figures.
Yet according to selectmen chairwomen Mary Pecoraro, the board told DeGeorge that the town couldn't determine the exact figures because it would shift town workers away from the jobs they are supposed to be performing, not because the numbers couldn't be determined at all.
"When Mr. DeGeorge came to the board of selectmen, he didn't have complete information and Mr. Berry determined that it would take a great deal of time for that to be gathered," explained Pecoraro. "It's a policy that it's a petitioner's responsibility to do all the research," she added.
After defeating article seven, the gathering approved article eight, a similar measure that gave tax breaks to seniors. In particular, the article proposed lowering the senior citizen eligibility age from 70 to 65 and would increase exemption amounts from $500 to $1000 for eligible persons. According to the finance and advisory board, a significant difference between the two articles is that article eight would limit eligibility based on income and estate worth.
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