Veterans’ services officer appointed
The selectmen voted unanimously to appoint Charles Butler of South Shaker Road the town’s new veterans’ services officer. Butler, the only resident to step up for the job, told the selectmen that he understands the job, which Chairman Randy Dean explained involves lots of paperwork that must be processed quickly. Delinquent submissions have caused the town to miss out on its 75 percent reimbursement for services provided in the past, according to Dean. Among the local veterans’ agent’s responsibilities are administering state emergency financial and medical assistance programs and providing assistance with federal compensation and pensions, state and federal education benefits, tax exemptions, annuities, home loans, and Persian Gulf War bonuses.
Selectmen to attend January JBOS meeting
The Board of Selectmen voted unanimously to join the Shirley and Ayer Boards of Selectmen next month to reconvene the Joint Boards of Selectmen (JBOS) to address the Devens disposition process. The process was suspended in November when the Devens Disposition Executive Board bounced it back to the three towns’ Boards of Selectmen after “scenario 2B” failed to garner enough support at the towns’ Special Town Meetings in October and again at the polls in November. Selectmen Randy Dean and Lucy Wallace said they hoped the Devens Citizens Advisory Committee would also be represented at the JBOS meeting. Referring to earlier discussions about including the towns’ planning boards on a revived JBOS, Selectman Bill Marinelli said that he opposes enlarging the body because it is “already unwieldy and notoriously ineffective.”
Selectmen support Devens’ participation; postpone decision on stakeholder status
Before the selectmen’s public meeting ended and they reconvened in executive session to discuss litigation, two Devens Citizens Advisory Committee members in the audience, Chairman Philip Crosby and Secretary David Winters, asked the Selectmen if they planned to respond to the committee’s November 20, 2006 letter to the board. The selectmen and their staff said they did not remember getting the request.
Winters explained that the letter contained two requests: one asked the selectmen to support granting “immediate equal membership of the Devens residents in the Joint Boards of Selectmen,” the other asked their support to “amend Section 23 of Chapter 498 to identify Devens residents as an equal stakeholder” in the disposition process. He added that the Ayer and Shirley Boards of Selectmen voted unanimously to support both requests several weeks ago.
Following a brief discussion, the selectmen unanimously voted to approve the first request—to include the Devens residents as members of the JBOS. The selectmen postponed voting on the second request— to amend the legislation creating the disposition process, calling it a “larger issue” requiring community input and discussion.
