As planning for the construction of a new Wellington Elementary moves forward, the architects, Wellington Building Committee, town and community members have been working hard to balance the needs of the school community with those of the surrounding neighborhood, as well as meet guidelines for safety, state mandates and so on. Needless to say, this isn’t always easy (in the same way that, say, three dimensional chess isn’t easy).
One area of discussion and concern with preliminary plans for the new school is around the impact of the new building on parking and drop-off/pick up space. Some Wellington neighbors have voiced concerns about traffic on adjoining streets, and fire and public safety officials want to make sure that the new school will be easily accessible by emergency vehicles in the event of …well…an emergency. Needless to say, there are also State mandates and codes that the building must conform to. While the Wellington Building Committee is responsible for many of the design decisions affecting the construction of the new school, many of the traffic issues fall outside of the group’s realm of responsibility.
Now an important meeting has been called to help address the concerns of neighbors and get all the responsible parties in the room to discuss the issues at hand. The meeting will take place on Wednesday, September 16 at 7:30 PM in the Board of Selectmen’s room at Town Hall. The meeting was called by Pat Brusch, Vice Chair of the WBC and Chair of the Permanent Building Committee and will involve members from the Planning Board, the Traffic Advisory Committee, the Board of Selectmen, the School Committee, Wellington PTO, the WBC and the Fire Chief, Police Chief, and Building Inspector.
There has been a lot of inaccurate or incomplete information floating around about the Wellington project. Some of that is due to the slow trickle of information from the WBC that’s been released to the public. Some of it is due to concerns from those involved in planning the new school that information that’s released before it is in its absolutely final form just leads to confusion, misplaced concerns and other distractions.
One thing’s clear: more and more open lines of communications between all of the many parties involved will help clear the air and alleviate tension. So if you’re a neighbor, Wellington Parent or simply a concerned citizen and want to have your voice heard on this important issue, make a note of the meeting date and time. We’ll see you there!
Interestingly, or maybe not so, this meeting is not listed on either town town or school Web sites, as of 9:55 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 15. While it has been posted on the notice board at the Town Hall yesterday around lunch time, not everyone goes in there to find out about meetings.
In fact, I would bet that more people find out about meetings visiting the town and school Web sites, reading Page 2 of the Citizen-Herald, and reading BloggingBelmont.com, than see them on that posting board.
Paul, I bet you would agree with me that it is EXTREMELY important for these types of meeting notices to be placed on both the town and school Web sites, as quickly as possible, so that members of the public and the press know about these meetings in a timely manner.
I don't know why this continues to be a problem but it is.
Interestingly, or maybe not so, this meeting is not listed on either town town or school Web sites, as of 9:55 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 15. While it has been posted on the notice board at the Town Hall yesterday around lunch time, not everyone goes in there to find out about meetings.
In fact, I would bet that more people find out about meetings visiting the town and school Web sites, reading Page 2 of the Citizen-Herald, and reading BloggingBelmont.com, than see them on that posting board.
Paul, I bet you would agree with me that it is EXTREMELY important for these types of meeting notices to be placed on both the town and school Web sites, as quickly as possible, so that members of the public and the press know about these meetings in a timely manner.
I don't know why this continues to be a problem but it is.
Known as Mrs. Nic, a teacher of three courses in the Wellington Enrichment Program, I have become sensitive to neighbors' concerns already —before ground breaking. Since I bring electronics, books, and live animals to my classes, I confess that I have broken a rule or two in order to protect their safety and that of my student “sherpas.”
Regarding the meeting tonight about Wellington traffic issues, I only found out about the date from the second page of the Belmont Citizen, reinforced today by ” Blogging Belmont.” This seems to be a vital opportunity for becoming a well-informed citizen and worker at Wellington. I look forward to hearing from town officials and other involved parties. The old saying still rings true: “A stitch in time saves nine.”
Known as Mrs. Nic, a teacher of three courses in the Wellington Enrichment Program, I have become sensitive to neighbors' concerns already —before ground breaking. Since I bring electronics, books, and live animals to my classes, I confess that I have broken a rule or two in order to protect their safety and that of my student “sherpas.”
Regarding the meeting tonight about Wellington traffic issues, I only found out about the date from the second page of the Belmont Citizen, reinforced today by ” Blogging Belmont.” This seems to be a vital opportunity for becoming a well-informed citizen and worker at Wellington. I look forward to hearing from town officials and other involved parties. The old saying still rings true: “A stitch in time saves nine.”
Known as Mrs. Nic, a teacher of three courses in the Wellington Enrichment Program, I have become sensitive to neighbors' concerns already —before ground breaking. Since I bring electronics, books, and live animals to my classes, I confess that I have broken a rule or two in order to protect their safety and that of my student “sherpas.”
Regarding the meeting tonight about Wellington traffic issues, I only found out about the date from the second page of the Belmont Citizen, reinforced today by ” Blogging Belmont.” This seems to be a vital opportunity for becoming a well-informed citizen and worker at Wellington. I look forward to hearing from town officials and other involved parties. The old saying still rings true: “A stitch in time saves nine.”
Thanks Christina and Tony — yeah: the bottleneck to get information online has become a major issue, as far as I'm concerned. I'm not sure what the issue is, exactly, but this seems to affect both Town and School operations. Meeting notifications then, after the fact, meeting minutes, etc. should all be easily accessible via the Town's snazzy new Web site in a timely manner. In addition, there should be a much larger library of documents and information online than is available now, IMHO. Maybe the Town needs to look at having a designated position responsible for moving info online and responding to citizens' requests for data/information. A digital ombudsman, if you will.
If I recall correctly, and I might be wrong on this, the notices are handled by a bunch of different departments. Legally, like other legal notices, the Clerk's employees get them and put them up on the wall,
time-stamped. They also keep track of the minutes of meetings too.
The part-time BOS secretaries used to update the site. I think they had a cut in that department so I don't know if they still do them all or not. But even they only updated what notices were sent to them.
I don't know who does it on the school end of things, I think it depends on what the notice is, right? The school systems updates its site but I don't know how the communication goes from SD to BOS to get the school notices up on the town site. Might be worth investigating.
It would seem that with all the secretaries, the clerk's employees, and IT employees – there are now three IT departments when there were once two and probably could be even one – that someone could be the point person to make sure all of this stuff gets online.