Conservation Agent Retires
Longtime Conservation Agent Mary Trudeau has announced her intention to retire.
Her retirement is “truly a loss to the community,” Belmont officials said Monday evening.
With her retirement, the plan is to merge her position with that of the tree warden, which, like the conservation agent role, is part-time. Thus, Tree Warden Will McPhee will assume the role of conservation agent while continuing his duties as the tree warden.
New Role Shared by Watertown, Belmont
A program that’s been run by Beech Street Center Assistant Director Heidi Barberio will now be run by a dedicated individual shared by Belmont and Watertown.
The Intermunicipal Agreement for Therapeutic Recreation Services was approved by the Select Board Monday evening.
“This person, this job, will take over the responsibilities of the Belmont-Watertown S.P.O.R.T. Program, which Heidi has so faithfully been running for years,” explained Community Services Director Brandon Fitts. “A number of years ago, Watertown and Belmont partnered together in a really great way and this sort of solidifies and cements this ongoing partnership. It helps bring some relief to Heidi who’s been working two jobs for a really long time.”
According to Town Administrator Patrice Garvin, Belmont “owns” this position, in that it will be a Belmont employee, but the town would be reimbursed by Watertown.
Board to Review Policies
The Select Board will continue reviewing and possibly bring to a vote a few policies that Select Board member Taylor Yates hopes will help to streamline meetings.
Those policies include: the Donation Policy, the Contract Policy, and the Town Land Use Policy.
Yates said he went through the Select Board agendas for 2025 and identified items he didn’t necessarily think required Select Board attention. For example, presently, all donations are required to be received by the Select Board, making extra work for the town administrator’s office, he said. An amendment to the policy could stipulate that donations greater than $10,000 would require Select Board acceptance, while donations less than $10,000 could be accepted by the administrator’s office.
This wouldn’t eliminate the possibility of ceremonial acceptances, he said.
He expressed a similar suggestion for contract changes. Small contracts, or recurring contracts with minimal change, could be handled by the town administrator without being reviewed first by the Select Board.
The board agreed to continue discussing at a future meeting.
Board Accepts Donation for Fire Department
The Select Board accepted a $50 donation from the family of a patient treated by the Fire Sign inDepartment.
According to town officials, the donation will go toward Emergency Management Services (EMS) equipment.
