None of my comments about the upcoming fall special town meeting have anything to do with the dog license changes, as I have no working knowledge of butlers, farms, dogs, or parks.

A view of the roof of the United States Patent Office Building following a fire in 1877.
A view of the roof of the United States Patent Office Building following a fire in 1877. Image courtesy Smithsonian Open Access.

I feel like the chatter surrounding the nearly $20 million ask from Millbury Public Schools implies, if not outright states, that this came out of nowhere or was otherwise some hidden cost snuck in after we completed Shaw. It wasn't, but that doesn't mean Article 10 feels good.

The Finance Committee, in their notes and recommendations, argue that the impact is approximately $250 per household per year. That calculates to a little under $21 dollars a month, the cost of maybe downgrading a few streaming services to watch a handful of ads again. A sober analysis is that a $20 million bond is not a huge ask, that the repairs are necessary, that it will be cheaper in the long run.

And yet.

My discomfort with the request is more on principle than on price. A major concern I have is about the remaining useful life of Elmwood Street School and the high school. While both have seen some repairs and expansions, Elmwood is closing in on 60 years of age and the high school nearly 75. My concern is that we're seeing a eye-catching financial ask for buildings that are arguably near or past their useful life.

Put another way: the Elmwood + high school roof projects are roughly a third of the price tag of new Shaw. Will this prolong the life of the schools in a meaningful way?

I'm personally not convinced, but it probably won't matter. It's rare an ask from the schools doesn't pass, and it's not like it's a bad idea as much as not a ripe one. For my money, I would roll the dice on waiting until a new administration enters office and we're not paying a premium on tariffs for building and solar materials. The Finance and School Committees offered an estimated 4% increase in costs if we were to wait (approximately $800k), and it's worth considering.

The Millbury Public Library, circa 1915. The building is brick, two people walk in front of it. The Torrey Mansion can be seen in the back.
The Millbury Public Library as it was pictured in the Centennial History of Millbury.

Article 8 is positioned as a procedural step toward the final disposition of the old fire headquarters. I said my piece earlier this year and stand by it: the building should be some sort of a community center, possibly via private-public partnership.

Regardless, this special town meeting is not to decide on the dispensation of the building, but only to set up the next steps. Why do I point this article out, then, when it's such a minor matter? Well, at least one individual who works at town hall has expressed, in open meetings, that the plan is to sell the place. This despite the building not yet being in control of the Board of Selectmen, without any requests for proposals issued, and without any broad discussion involving the 14,000 of us who live in this town.

I have not reached out to this person, and I don't intend to put them on blast in a newsletter a couple hundred people read. With that said, I am getting that nagging feeling that this is procedural theater, up to and including a solicitation process that will be open in name only. That those of us who are working behind the scenes to try and make something happen with this space, or have been working for years on various angles to try and make this work out for the most people, have been spinning our wheels while the decision is made without us.

I think I'm paranoid; I hope I'm wrong.

(As an aside, I wonder if it would be legal to divest the property at all. My very limited research isn't much, but the consensus of available information is that Delia Torrey, of Torrey House / Taft House fame, donated the land from the fire station to Waters Street to the town for the library. I don't know what that contract might have looked like, and it wouldn't shock me if it burned down with the original town hall in the 1970s, but it's an interesting thought exercise,)

A watercolor of houses along a street. Some triple deckers, a boxcar diner, and an old car is seen in the road. Four people are walking on the sidewalk.
"Old Houses" by Prescott Jones (c. 1935-1942), as part of the The Massachusetts WPA Federal Art Project Photograph Collection at Digital Commonwealth.

The most important articles are probably the least sexy ones, Articles 11 and 12 for accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and for inclusionary zoning.

I won't take much time on the ADUs, as it's another procedural effort to align our rules with existing state law. If the ChatGPT summaries posted by certain rabblerousers are to be believed, we will likely spend more time on Article 11 than we should.

Article 12, however, is a needed change. In short, this is an active effort to encourage low income housing and increase the housing stock in town. I've also said my piece on this, but in short: Millbury needs more affordable housing, full stop. This will make it easier to get affordable housing by ensuring a streamlined process for larger builds.

That's the part people need to understand, and the part the degrowth advocates in town will try desperately to spin. This isn't to make it easier for a single-family development to dump a bunch of apartments in it, this is to make it easier for the next Cobblestone Village to provide affordable units.

That's it. That's the whole proposal, wrapped in lawyer-friendly legalese and placed in front of us for approval.

In a more just world, this would be approved as quickly and without fanfare as exempting those with disabilities from dog license fees for their service animals. Instead, we will probably spend an hour or more rehashing the same arguments that were stale when we discussed the MBTA zoning.

I'm already exhausted and the meeting hasn't come up yet. Let's just hope we're not spending so long there that the old high school roof caves in on us.

(Or maybe that would be a mercy?)

Jeff Raymond is a 40-plus year resident of Millbury and loves the town even if it doesn't always love him back. He also writes at MassTransparency.org and can be reached at jeff.raymond@bramanvilletribune.com or Twitter/X (@jeffinmillbury) or BlueSky (@jeff.masstransparency.org)