Feeney: Town Garage is ‘Falling Apart,’ Needs to be Addressed

In dire need of replacement, Medfield’s Department of Public Works town garage is literally falling apart, according to DPW superintendent Ken Feeney.

“One door just fell off … the back door,” Feeney said. “Insurance company told us that we should be replacing the two doors in the mechanics bay.”

Feeney spoke to 484 voters at last spring’s Annual Town Meeting about the current condition of the 38-year-old building, pointing to its poor physical condition as a driving force for replacement.

Feeney told Medfield Patch contributor Theresa Knapp prior to last spring’s town meeting the building was “literally rotting away” and is no longer “a very efficient building at all.”              

Feeney told Knapp at the time the roof of the building was “leaking like a sieve,” the lighting for making repairs was of poor quality, there were numerous electrical problems, a large heat loss, it had been exposed to a great deal of salt over the years, it was not fully OSHA [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] compliant, and “overall had very poor working conditions for the men.”

Today, those problems continue to exist and in some cases worsen after last year’s warrant article failed to pass the town’s special election in May, despite earning the 2/3 approval at town meeting to be placed on the special election ballot. At the election, 1,000 of 1,755 voters chose not to approve the $10 million debt exclusion bond for the proposed town garage, forcing Feeney and the building committee to go back to the drawing board.

“The building committee would like me to re-look at the plans to see if I can bring the scope down and the overall cost. I’m working with our consultants,” Feeney said, who shoulders the responsibility for it not passing the election.

“Last year, I think it was a little bit of a hurry,” Feeney said. “You can blame me for that. I just thought it would be a good year to build a garage and the taxpayers would save a lot of money if we could get it out to bid. It is still a good time to bid projects.”

Feeney believes part of the reason the proposed garage passed town meeting but failed special election was because after town meeting, the DPW went silent to comply with Proposition 2 ½, which has strict regulations in place against campaigning during a special town election.

“It’s a shame that we, I think [the DPW] probably fell asleep for the election,” Feeney said. “Before the town meeting, we passed out a lot of information at the transfer station and things like that. We were afraid to do that afterwards, we were warned … Proposition 2 ½ prevents us from campaigning on the highway garage. We really went silent on it and a lot of people came to us and said we really shouldn’t have done that … we should have had some people that could have voiced information.”

Feeney plans to spend more time campaigning and voicing information on the town garage project this time around.

“We will look into holding public hearings, sharing information with the public,” Feeney said. “We will go out to the senior center and meet with the seniors, we will go out to the school department … we’ll go out to everybody.”

The first order of business for Feeney and the consultants when they are ready to discuss their modified proposal on the DPW garage will be to meet with the Board of Selectmen and gain its collective support for the project.

“The whole thing is I have to get the selectmen together, I have to get them all in on the project,” Feeney said. People in the community listen [to the selectmen]. We [can’t] have indecision and questions; we have to answer everything from the board. Again, I can take the blame for that, trying to rush the project.”

Feeney acknowledged Board of Selectmen chair Osler Peterson had questions that went unanswered at town meeting and selectman Ann Thompson was indecisive on whether she supported the project or not, while selectman Mark Fisher supported the proposal.

“I know the Board [of Selectmen] was puzzled,” said Feeney. “Ann was on the fence, voted for it at town meeting, Pete had a lot of questions and Mark was for it. We are going to be working closely with the Board of Selectmen, we want support from the board, all three of the selectmen voting for the project, understanding the project 100 percent.”

Feeney said his goal since the project failed last May has been to drive costs down to make it more appealing to voters when it is presented at a future town meeting, which he and the building committee hope will be this coming fall.

“The building committee was talking about a special town meeting in the fall,” Feeney said. “We have to be out and we have to interact more with the public [before the proposal can be presented at town meeting].”

Feeney pointed out it is important to resolve the issue of the town garage soon because other capital projects are coming up and the town cannot “print money” to fund them. Other projects on the horizon include new police and fire stations, Dale Street School renovations and Parks and Recreation.

“All of these capital projects and needed improvements have to be taken and spread out over a period of time to be built,” Feeney said. “We have a number of projects coming up and we would like to try and bring [the garage] back.”

The public works facility is just about 100 percent designed, according to Feeney and “the taxpayers are into it for $1.1 million right now.” While that’s good reasoning to address the DPW garage soon, it’s not the driving force.

“[The building] is in desperate need of replacement and to be brought up to date with the modern and environmental issues that come with these types of facilities,” Feeney said. “We will see what we can do [to make it more appealing to voters].”