Seekonk Select Board fills five volunteer openings, directs town hall generator study

SEEKONK -- October 9, 2015, Seekonk Select Board fills five volunteer posts and orders generator cost study ahead of November town meeting. The board on October 9 unanimously appointed Michael Dresser to the Historical Commission, Tim Tolman, a painter and Rhode Island School of Design professor, to the Arts and Cultural Council, civil engineer Michael Campagnon to the Conservation Commission, retired union treasurer Bob Damiani to the Tax Workoff Committee, and Raquel Lima as part-time kennel worker. The board also accepted with regret the resignation of Fire Department senior secretary Sharon Gogan and authorized Town Administrator Scott Kadim to post the position. Two in-kind donations from J.R. Marshall and Son, 52 yards of concrete valued at $5,000 and rebar and mesh valued at $1,500, were accepted for the Veterans Memorial, which the committee is targeting for a Memorial Day dedication. The most contested item was a consensus direction to Kadim to obtain engineering estimates for connecting town hall to the public safety complex generator before November town meeting; member Nelson Almeida argued the building has no emergency function and the expense represents a want rather than a need, while members David Brady and Dave Vieira cited risks to basement records and dry-pipe sprinkler systems during prolonged outages. The acting DPW director reported salt locked in at $70.40 per ton and vendor applications out to 30 contractors, but flagged that the department enters the season with only one operational snowblower attachment for its trackless machines after retiring an aging large dump truck.