$1,000,000 in Grants from Healey Administration 

On Monday, October 20, the Webster October town meeting was able to meet quorum by one attendee. Needed town voters were 61 for a quorum and 62 were in attendance. There were six articles on the town warrant. Article 1 involved reports from the Finance Committee/Selectboard to act upon the two boards’ recommendations. Articles 2, 3, and 4 were monetary transfers from Treasury Funds to pay unpaid bills from the Town Administrator, Sewer Dept., and Water Dept. Article 5 concerned acceptance of two parcels of land on Houghton Street located in a single-family residential zoning district, and Article 6 dealt with a $15,000 fund transfer for replacement of aging multi-gas meters for the Fire Department. All articles were approved. 

Webster Town Administrator Rick LaFond stated that the town has been looking to hire a new Director of Planning and Economic Development. Ann Morgan, the current Director, who will be leaving her position soon, has been assisting the town until a replacement is hired. 

“We haven’t been successful in finding and hiring a replacement for Ms. Morgan,” stated LaFond. “There’s competition and our salary for this position is very competitive. We’ve been doing hands-on recruiting. All departments here work reasonably well, are very coordinated, and cohesive. It’s a bonus to coordinate working together. The camaraderie helps planning immensely and more importantly it’s the cohesiveness and the mutual trust that everyone feels towards each other. We want to ensure we hire the right personality. We’re searching for someone who may not be actively looking for a new position and who would appreciate real teamwork. We’re optimistic. Ann Morgan is not someone whom you can easily replace. Her knowledge, history, and professionalism are hard to replace.”

The Town Clerk and the Town Administrator’s Offices will soon be swapping spaces at the town hall. The Town Clerk will soon be located on the first floor and the Town Administrative offices will migrate to the second floor to accommodate the conventional foot traffic for the Clerk’s office and also to create more public meeting space for small committees and working groups in the Administrator’s offices. The new first floor location of the Clerk’s office will allow better handicap access and better use of space. The flooding problems of the basement offices will hopefully be addressed soon as bids to alleviate the flooding situation will be going out soon.

The Selectboard’s November 10 meeting will address the Webster Police Department’s consultant’s staffing study. Issues will be made known to the public at that time. 

Additionally, the Massachusetts Dept. of Environmental Protection has allocated $500,000 to assist Webster to treat PFAS in the town’s drinking water. Known as “forever chemicals” because they break down very slowly, PFAS are the toxic man-made, per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals.  These poisonous chemicals are found in such products as Teflon and Scotchgard and have been in use since World War II. The Webster grant will greatly assist the town with funding for its PFAS filtration plant currently under construction. 

Webster has also received notification of another $500,000 grant from the Governor Healey-Driscoll Administration. This grant will assist with funding for Main Street, South Main Street, and North Main Street infrastructure projects such as road reconstruction and safety while improving pedestrian, bicycle, and transit access between proposed developments and existing businesses throughout the area.