More Dissension
On Municipal Building
By M. D. Drysdale

Despite the Town Meeting vote that favored moving the Randolph town offices to the former co-op space on Pleasant Street, the offices may not move.

The Randolph Selectboard now has a three-man majority that favors keeping the offices in the current Summer Street building, which would be expanded and renovated.

"My position is that the selectboard can decide the question of the municipal building," said the new selectboard chair, Stephen Webster, at a contentious meeting Tuesday evening.

"The board has a lot of questions to answer ... I am not ready to move forward right now."

Webster’s statement came in answer to a question directed to all five board members by Chuck Webb, one of the organizers of a petition drive that brought the municipal building question to a Town Meeting vote.

The ballot question, which resulted from the petition, asked whether the voters would "authorize changing the use of $1.2 million general obligation bond money … from the renovation and expansion of the present municipal building" and use it instead to buy the co-op space. Voters favored the move by 719 to 694.

Tuesday’s selectboard discussion attracted a crowd of about 30 people, including most of the major players in the eight-year drama. They included Bill Baumann, whose DuBois & King engineering firm had been contracted to do part of the work at the current location; Jesse "Sam" Sammis, who owns the former co-op space and would be in charge of renovations if the offices move there; and Bill Kevan, a local contractor who has kept the project at bay through a string of successful lawsuits.

Tempers sometimes flared but civility was maintained. At least two threats of lawsuits were made by various speakers. At the end of almost two hours’ discussion, Chairman Webster attempted to call the board into executive session to discuss "real estate options."

Selectman Larry Townsend, however, moved to table the whole issue until the next meeting to allow the discussion to cool down. Webster and Selectman Joe Voci, a strong opponent of moving the offices, voted against tabling, but Selectman Ken Goss broke ranks and voted with Townsend and Jim Hutchinson to table further action.

Thus, any action was postponed until the next meeting April 1.

Selectmen Polled

Chuck Webb’s poll of the selectboard established a summary of the opinions on the newly-constituted board. After Webster’s statement, Goss responded to Webb that "I have been against it (moving the offices) from the beginning," citing the economic impact.

The Town Meeting vote, he said, was "not a majority." He later withdrew that observation after a chorus of protest from the audience.

Townsend answered Webb by saying "It should be what the people wanted." Hutchinson agreed, echoing that, "I don’t have any choice but to endorse the will of the people."

Hutchinson, the former chairman, noted he is worried that a continuing debate will make costs rise.

"This was not an ill-considered vote on the part of the townspeople," he said.

Selectman Voci, however, felt otherwise. He answered Webb’s question by saying, "I do question (that the vote expressed) the will of the people."

He expressed doubt that voters acted on correct information. Some expenses for the move to the co-op building were not publicized beforehand, he claimed, but this was roundly denied by both Webb and Town Manager Peter Butterfield.

Voci also said he understood that the issue could be re-voted again, as long as the selectboard agrees. Webb disputed this also, and produced a guideline from the Secretary of State that said, "Voters can only force the reconsideration of an article by petition once within a period of one year from the first vote."

The statement goes on to say: "However, the (selectboard) can call a special meeting to reconsider any article except bonding proposals as many times as the board desires."

Talk of Lawsuits

The wording may seem ambiguous, but Webb warned that "If you don’t want a lawsuit on your hands, you’d better do it correctly."

Baumann paid a rare visit to the selectboard and intimated that if the original plans on Summer Street are not carried out, the town might also have a lawsuit on its hands. D&K joined with Scott & Parners, architects, and Professional Construction, Inc. (PCI), contractors to propose a design-build expansion of the municipal offices that was accepted by the town, which awarded a contract.

That contract was declared invalid by District Court Judge Mary Teachout, in one of the lawsuits filed by Kevan.

Baumann said his firm has been paid for the work it had already done on behalf of the contract. However, he said, PCI spent a lot of time on it that it was not paid for. PCI will be "looking for damages" if the town turns its back on the formerly-approved project, he declared.

"It was an illegal contract to begin with," responded Kevan.

Baumann also attempted to calm fears that the original project would now be too expensive, after years of steeply-escalating construction prices. Because of the current downturn, he said, "a likelihood of any inflationary increase from the 2005 figures is small."

He also said costs could be reduced by changing some aspects of the project.

Sammis Explains

Sammis then gave further explanations of his proposal to the town, which officially expired on March 15. He said, however, that the offer could be extended for a few weeks or a month, though not for a year.

"It’s up to you guys to decide whether the voters have spoken or not," he said. Then he added: "The game goes into overtime and one team wins—does the loser come back and say ‘I want to play the game over?’"

Webster grilled Sammis briefly as to why he had purchased the co-op space in the first place, implying that he might have bought it expressly to sell it back to the town.

"Did anybody in the town (government) encourage you to buy it?" he asked.

"Nobody," Sammis responded.

At that point, Webster proposed an executive session, but the issue was tabled instead.