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The Raynham Channel
Raynham Select Board 09/23/2025
(Episode Description is AI generated and may be errors in accuracy)
Some meetings hum along; this one pulses with real-life stakes. We open with a fast-moving agenda and quickly get into a focused public health briefing: current mosquito risk levels across town and a clear, trustworthy primer on bedbugs—how to spot them, where they hide, and what prevention actually works. It’s practical, evidence-based guidance backed by a coming town nurse presentation designed to answer your questions and ease the itch of uncertainty.
From there, we dive into animal control and the everyday mechanics that keep residents and pets safe. You’ll hear how the team handles loose dogs, why licensing and rabies documentation matter, and how donations are used for emergencies that can’t wait. The conversation then shifts to the quiet backbone of local government: approvals and contracts that protect environmental compliance at the landfill and transfer station, plus engineering expertise to keep operations safe and within state standards.
The heart of the meeting beats around infrastructure and community. We walk through a strategic reallocation of Complete Streets funding to build Mill Street sidewalks sooner, with a grant extension that safeguards future projects. Then we pivot to celebration: a packed Community Day with 50-plus exhibitors, back-to-back performances, kids’ activities, and a slate of sponsors powering the festivities. It’s the best of civic life—safer streets and shared moments—built together.
We also share important governance updates endorsed by the Attorney General: the board’s modernized name, a more workable Finance Committee quorum, a raised capital threshold to match today’s costs, and progress on MBTA Communities Act compliance. Finally, we make space for citizen voices in a charged property-line dispute on Church Street, hearing both sides and taking the proper step to refer the matter to the building commissioner and town counsel. It’s a reminder that rules, transparency, and process protect everyone when stakes run high.
If you value clear decisions, practical public health tips, and a candid look at how local government balances rights, safety, and community, this one’s worth your time. Subscribe, share with a neighbor, and leave a review to help more residents find the show—and tell us what topic you want addressed next.
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I'm going to call the meeting to order of the Rainham Select Board here on Tuesday, September 23rd, 2025 at 558 South Main Street. Again, calling the meeting to order at 7 o'clock p.m. This meeting is open to the public. It is also being broadcast live on the Rainham Channel through Comcast Channel 98 and Verizon Channel 34. It is also being recorded for replay on the Rainham Channel. Please join us for the Pledge of Allegiance. Liberty and such referral. Thank you. Our first agenda item is the acceptance of the minutes. I'm looking for a vote to accept as printed the regular session of September 16, 2025, and to hold on the executive session minutes of September 16, 2025. So moved.
SPEAKER_04:Seconded.
SPEAKER_01:Motion is made and seconded. Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor. Any opposed? So voted. Next we have Department Head Reports, and we have our health director, Paula Rossi Flapp. Welcome, Paula, with her monthly report.
SPEAKER_00:Good evening. Quickly, the month went by. I have a Board of Health update to share. Last check of the DPH risk maps for Tripoli and West Nile in Rainham and surrounding towns show we are still in the moderate risk level. So continue to use precautions, and next month will probably be my last time that I will be reporting on the levels. Bedbugs have been a new concern among the community housing, but really everybody's at risk who travels, and I'll probably get everybody itching after this report. But I just wanted to share a little information about bedbugs. Bugs. Bedbugs are a small reddish-brown, blood-sucking, wingless insect. Bedbugs bite, usually clear up without treatment in about a week or two. Bedbugs aren't known to spread disease, but they can cause an allergic reaction or severe skin reaction in some people. Bedbugs are about the size of an apple seed. They hide in cracks and crevices of beds, box springs, headboards, bed frames, and other objects around the bed and come out at night to feed on their preferred host, which is mainly humans. The risk of running into bed bugs is higher if you spend time in places where nighttime guests come and go, such as hotels, hospitals, or homeless shelters. If you have bed bugs in your home, professional extermination is recommended. The symptoms of bedbug bites are similar to symptoms of other insect bites and rashes. Bedbugs bites are usually inflamed spots, often with a darker spot in the middle. They're itchy, they're arranged in a rough line or cluster, and they're located on the face, neck, arms, and hands. Some people have no reaction to bed bugs. I knew that was going to get me eventually. All they need is a warm host and plenty of hiding spaces. So this information came to me and I found it on the Mayo Clinic website. Our town nurse Lindsay Miranda is putting together a presentation for public enjoyment, and I will report next month the dates and places to attend where you can learn all about bed bugs and ask questions and uh and just find out more about how you can avoid them. And oh uh the last thing on the Board of Health is I just want to remind everybody that the Board of Health will have a table at the community day on Sunday, and excuse me, we'll be giving out some uh nice information and some swag, and I'm hoping that my table mate over here, the town administrator, will be joining me in that competition of how many people visit our table. Um so let's see, animal control update. Things have calmed down at the animal control building, however, we are getting numerous calls for loose dogs. Just so that the public is aware what happens when we do have a loose dog, we when we retain a loose dog, it is brought to our holding facility, assessed for aggression, then checked for a caller with name tag and phone number, license and rabies tag, plus scanned for a microchip. If known, the animal control officer immediately tries to contact the owner and set up a time to meet to release the dog. If proof of the date, uh if if proof of a rabies or license is missing from the dog on the caller, then the animal control officer works with the owner and gives up to a week to produce these documents. If documents are not provided, then the ACO will proceed with fines. So this all comes down to public safety. It's very easy to license your dog here at the town hall as well as get your rabies uh shot at um at a vet or if they have a rabies clinic. We're always here to help, so you can always ask and call us and find out if there's a rabies clinic around uh close by. We are well stocked with donated items at this time, but if the public still wishes to donate new or like new dog or cat items, we now have a donation bin located at the building. The building address is 2253 King Phillip Street. It's the building to the left of the senior center. If the public wishes to give a monetary donation, they need to make their checkout to the town of Rainham and put in the in the memo line AC donation fund. And either mail it to the town hall here at 558 South Main Street in care of animal control or hand delivered to the Board of Health office at the town hall. These funds are used for emergency vet bills or for any necessary animal control-related items or issues that the budget may not be able to fund. Remember, it is flea and tick season, and those pests love to hire hitch a ride on our furry family members and set up shop in our home, so start checking for fleas and ticks, especially now that the weather is cooler. Unlike today, because it's actually hotter. So you know the cooler weather brings them in. And that is my report to the board and the public.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you, Paula. Questions, comments, Mr. Pacico? Thank you. All right, Mr. Collins. No questions, Paula. Thank you for all your efforts. All right, see you. Thanks, Paula. All right, continuing with our agenda, we have no appointment, no appointments scheduled this evening, no public hearings. Completion of older continuing business. Do you have anything, Mr. Pacheco?
SPEAKER_04:None, madam.
SPEAKER_01:Mr. Collins? Mr. Barnes, do you have anything under older continuing business that's not on the agenda?
SPEAKER_03:I do not, although I do expect we'll have the draft uh bylaw, um I'm sorry, uh tag day policy for next week's agenda.
SPEAKER_01:Sure, and you were going to post that on the website too between now and then, correct? Thank you. Okay, then we move to new business. We have a tag day request for September 27th and October 4th for the Bridgewater Rainham High School Girls Basketball team. Motion to approve. Motion is made and seconded. Any discussion? Hearing none all in favor. Any opposed? So voted. Next we have a tag day request for November 2nd, November 9th, and November 15th for kick cancer.
SPEAKER_04:Motion to approve.
SPEAKER_01:Motion is made and seconded. Any discussion? Hearing not all in favor. Any opposed? So voted. Next we have a tag day request for October 18th, November 26th, November 28th, November 29th, and November 30th for full house all-stars boosters.
SPEAKER_04:Motion to approve. And second.
SPEAKER_01:Motion has been made and seconded. Any discussion. Hearing none, all in favor. Any opposed? It is so voted. Next we have a change of officers and ownership interest in Orion Family Amusement at L LLC at 115 New State Highway. We need to set a hearing date for this.
SPEAKER_04:Sure. So we'll see.
SPEAKER_01:All right. Any further discussion? Hearing on all in favor? So so voted. Thank you. Okay, next on the agenda, so that hearing date is set. Next we have discussion and vote of the contract with tie-in bond for fiscal year 2026 landfill and transfer station engineering services. Mr. Barnes, anything you can tell us about this? Is this an approval?
SPEAKER_03:Oh, we do this every year. Okay. So this is a good question.
SPEAKER_01:And it's recommended by you. Recommended by you and by our highway superintendent?
SPEAKER_03:Uh yes. Right. Motion to approve.
SPEAKER_01:Motion is made. Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor? Any opposed? It is so voted. Next, discussion and vote of contract with tie and bond for fiscal year 2026 for Flair Advice Engineering Services. And I assume this is also Mr. Barnes recommended by you and Mr. Strodivent?
SPEAKER_04:Yes. Motion to approve and second.
SPEAKER_01:Motion is made and seconded. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all in favor? Any opposed? So voted. Next we have discussion and vote to approve. Extension and request to partially reallocate a mass DOT complete streets grant. Mr. Barnes.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, we currently have a complete streets grant for$400,000. It's geared for a shared use path on King Phillips Drive. We wish to reallocate$200,000 of that money for Mill Street sidewalks. The reason we're doing that is that project's further ahead, and we want to use the money now. Also, the grant we needed to extend the grant deadline to uh and and the state is allowing us to extend it through 630 of 27.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you, Mr. Barnes. Motion to approve. Motion is made. Seconded. Any further discussion? Hearing that all in favor? Any opposed? So voted. Moving right along here, that brings us to our town administrators report. Mr. Barnes.
SPEAKER_03:As was mentioned, I plan on being at the community day answering questions regarding town government and such on uh Sunday the 28th. Hopefully it won't be rained out, but no, no, no, it's sunshine.
SPEAKER_01:I just said sunshine, yes.
SPEAKER_03:All right. Well, it's supposed to rain start raining tomorrow, I guess. But sunshine on Sunday. So it'll be all sunshine and and and bright out. So I plan on being there. Um and uh just to remind everyone, our town meeting is scheduled for November 17th, and the uh Warren articles are due October 10th.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you, Mr. Barnes. Any questions for Mr. Barnes?
SPEAKER_03:Uh no.
SPEAKER_04:Mr.
SPEAKER_01:Collins? That moves us to select men's report. Mr. Did you guys?
SPEAKER_04:Thank you, Madam Chair. Just one quick item. We had our annual Bristol County Advisory Board meeting last Thursday. Uh uh we got through the budget for the year, and I'm proud to report I was uh unanimously re-elected by my colleagues as chairman of the advisory board committee. Congratulations. Thank you. And that is all I have, Madam Chair.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you, Mr. Collins.
SPEAKER_04:I have nothing to report.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, just I have a couple things. I had the opportunity to attend this past Sunday, the sixth annual Thai food fair at the our Buddhist temple over on South Street East. As always, it was well attended, and is always they have great entertainment, and um, they are always so gracious in welcoming everybody to attend their event and uh tour their beautiful facility there. Their next special event is really their largest event, is that it is their New Year's celebration, and that happens on the last Saturday in April, so it'll be April 26, 2026. So if you've never been there, mark that on your calendar because it's a great place to visit and um um and enjoy the entertainment and everything that they have there. Other than that, as referred to, this Sunday is our annual Rainham Community celebration, and the weather forecast is looking great. We have over 50 exhibitors and back-to-back entertainment kicking off at 11:30 with the Bridgewater and Tiffany O'Brass Society Band. They are going to present a concert, and then we have um entertainment back to back through 4 o'clock, and all kinds of events going on, face painting for the children. There's a kids' zone over by the senior center. There'll be um pony rides for the children and a magic show, a reptile show, a petting zoo, and um all kinds of great things going on. And the senior center will be open with a RAV our bake sale, which is a mini fundraiser for the event, and also the Pie Baking Contest. Just want to send out a thank you to the sponsors for the event. That's Bluestone Bank, Wind Waste Innovations, Recycling Solutions, Bristol County Savings Bank, Harbor One Bank, the Rain Am Cultural Council, RAVE, the Taunt Municipal Lighting Plant, Personal Best Karate, and Lucini Bus Lines, and they present, they provide all the funding for all the paid entertainment and all the supplies for that event. So we thank them for that and hope to see everybody there Sunday, 12 to 4. But if you get there at 11:30, the concert actually starts then. And that is all that I have for Selectman's report. Under correspondence, the RF Massachusetts Attorney General has approved the bylaws that were voted at the annual town meeting of May 19th. Um, do you want to comment on that, Mr. Barnes?
SPEAKER_03:Uh there were four bylaws that were uh voted. The first one was to change the name of the board of selectmen to select board. So from here on in, the select book board of selectmen is now select board, and we are in the process of changing our letterhead and the town website and everything else to reflect that. Another bylaw uh reduced the full quorum of FinCom members from seven to five. Another one changed the definition of uh capital projects to be considered by the uh uh capital project committee from 10,000 to 25,000. And finally, the attorney general did sign off on what's commonly known as the MBTA Communities Act that still has to be voted or or signed off by the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, but it got through the Attorney General with no no amendments.
SPEAKER_01:Excellent. And again, those were all approved at the annual town meeting in May. And I just want to send out a thank you to the Ray Name Girl Scouts, who are the ones who actually inspired us uh to change our name to the Ray Name Select Board because some of them might want to sit here someday. So all right, um, so that is that, and then it brings us up to uh press time. Anyone here from the press who wishes to speak? If not, emergency business. Do you have anything to Chico? Mr. Collins, we're gonna say Mr. Barnes, do you have any emergency business?
SPEAKER_03:No emergency citizen.
SPEAKER_01:That brings us up to citizen and community input. If anybody wishes to address the board, please just step up, state your name and address for the minutes.
SPEAKER_02:I represent her in current and future legal matters. I bring this year attention because for a year and a half now she's been calling to this town for help and received none. She has been attempting to get a hold of numerous people. She had an attorney prior to me who has since retired. And for a year and a half, issues that have been happening along their line between her and her neighbor, who has auspiciously shown up today, has been growing in concern. There have been multiple statutory and bylaw violations. I have talked to Mr. Ayer Fredi. I was able to speak with him last week. He claims that there is a farm exemption. I'm going to go through that step by step. Today I would just like to introduce to you some of the infractions that are currently there, and then we're going to ask you, beg you, to have your town building commissioner enforce the rules as they are on the books. Not take sides, not do anything special, just enforce the rules. On 451 Church Street, as it stands right now, there's a pig sty that is visible directly from the road. It is not occupied by pigs, but it's been there for more than a year, meaning that it was never intended to hold pigs. On top of that, Mr. Aruda had TMLP drop two dummy poles. These are normally 30-foot-tall electrical poles that require a lot of manpower, time, and equipment in order to install. He was offered them to be placed between two trees so they wouldn't be visible from the public, and he ordered them instead to place them as close to Mrs. Daly's property as possible in visible light. He has not run electrical wires to them, and it's been over a year since they've been installed. A waste of money. He did, to my knowledge, request that the barbs also be installed, but they were rejected by the installer because that's statutorily illegal. That fence is, by statute and by bylaw, considered to be a nuisance. It's also considered to be a revenge fence. Additionally, he has had connexes, large metal containers placed along the property line between the two of them. By the bylaws of this town, that is to be placed behind the principal house, which is further down the road, into the rear of the property and covered by vegetation. It has done none of these. They are all visible from the street lining her property. Worse than this, he has placed 20-foot-tall poles in which he had cameras installed along the property line, all facing directly towards her property, with some looking into her house. It has come to my attention that he has sent images and possibly videos from these cameras to third parties. I am not asking you to restrict farmlands. We are not asking you to stop a farmer from building their business or to grow or to till the land. Those are things that Section 3 was meant to do and that this proud community does as it supports farmers. But none of these uses are in line with farming. Section three does not restrict you from making any bylaws against farming, just unreasonable ones. And I don't think asking for pigs to be in a pig sty or remove the style, having connexes removed from the line and put into the back of the rear of the property, having dummy poles that were pointlessly and fruitlessly installed removed, having a barbed wire fence removed, or to not have cameras looking in on your property removed, are unreasonable by any stretch of the imagination. After this, we will have no other alternative but to go to litigation. We are praying for relief from this town to just simply enforce the rules. Thank you.
SPEAKER_01:All right, thank you, Mr. Norris. I think that appropriate would be to refer this to our building commissioner and town council. Yes.
SPEAKER_04:I'm looking for direction.
SPEAKER_01:We obviously had no um notice that you were coming in for this. It's not what we usually expect Republican, but I believe somebody else in the audience wants to speak. So thank you, Mr. Norris.
SPEAKER_05:Uh Joseph Baruto, 369 Church Street. Um it it's kind of comical to listen to somebody lie to your face. Um the fence was put up for animals, one. The poles were put up for electric, but then uh the neighbor decided that she was going to try suing us because she said the the land that I bought wasn't ours. So that there was a little bit of a holdup um for that part. As far as cameras, we had to put cameras because people aren't trustyworthy over there. So we have cameras to protect the animals. Um as far as looking into someone's house, that's an exaggeration. As far as putting a pole behind a tree, I think we all know there's no trees on that driveway. So if he just wants to come up here and look like he's doing something, talk to the building inspector. We are going to put up bob wire. It doesn't have bob wire right now because the neighbor made a complaint about it. But as the safety of people to not be able to jump over the fence and get into the pen when I get the bulls there, we're going to put barbed wire on that fence. As far as the Carnex boxes, there's nothing illegal about the Carnex boxes being there. If you if the town, if he wants to go to litigation, we're all about that too. Because I'm gonna that is gonna stay a farm. My father was a farmer, they're not farmers. I'm a farmer, my son's a farmer, we're gonna continue farming the land. If we weren't harassed every time we went there, it probably would be a lot cleaner. But every time we go there, we're harassed, videotaped, foolishness, just like tonight. So I thank you guys for taking consideration. But as far as the board, I don't think there's nothing anything buddy should even have to waste their time with. And as far as wasting money, it's my money. If I want to waste it, I can. It's like wasting time going to court over stupid stuff. But thank you.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you, Mr. Um, Mr. Chief?
SPEAKER_04:No, I mean we I would just say we'll take it under advisement.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, so make a motion to take it under advisement. Okay, um, any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of the matters taken under advisement. Thank you. Any other public input? Seeing none. Uh just to report performance of administrative duties. I, along with the bill our town uh finance director, have reviewed and signed the Rainham invoice and payroll warrants. And uh with that, I'm looking for a motion that we go into executive session in accordance with Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 38, Section 21A2 and 3, to conduct strategy sessions in preparation for negotiations with non-union personnel, or to conduct collective bargaining sessions or contract negotiations with non-union personnel, and to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation, if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of the public body, and the chair so declares, and this is with respect to non union positions and the police decisions. We have a motion and a second. Roll call vote, Mr. Pacheco, Mr. Collins. Chair votes aye. We are going into executive session at 7 25 p.m. Thank you so much.