The Town Council’s Monday, June 19 meeting was filled to the brim with several agenda items, including public hearings, acceptance of numerous donations, and efforts to honor several members of the community.
At the start of the meeting, Chairman Tom Dolan held a moment of silence for Dottie Grover, a longtime volunteer at Londonderry Access Cable Center who recently passed away. Dolan then cited Resolution 2017-07, which officially renamed the center the “Dottie Grover Cable Access Center.”
Another longtime resident of Londonderry was then honored for his services to the community. Londonderry Superintendent Nate Greenberg, who has served the town and its school district for 17 years, will be retiring at the end of the month. Dolan presented Greenberg with a plaque for his work. Dolan fondly remembered his time with Greenberg, noting how well he “represented the community” and how the two of them worked hard in the past at the state house to protect school funding. Upon also receiving a town jacket with his name embroidered on it as well as a pillow to “help him rest,” Greenberg thanked those in attendance, noting that “this is a fantastic community” and that it was well worth supporting over the years.
Followed by this was a quick series of agenda items, including Bonnie Roberts with the Senior Resource Committee informing the council about an outreach program they did with elderly communities about what they see as essential issues in their town, nominations to the town’s Capital Improvement Program Committee, and recognition of John Percy, a local Boy Scout, whose Eagle Scout project helped to design and raise funds for a new fire danger warning sign outside the town’s fire department.
The public hearings then began, although most discussion occurred from the council itself.
The first topic was Ordinance #2017-04, which would implement limits on outdoor lawn watering in the event of a drought situation, as well as based around the severity of the drought, although it is currently unused since there are no droughts currently afflicting Londonderry.
Although Butler recued himself from voting, citing a letter he had received saying there was conflict of interest due to his sons landscaping business, the ordinance was passed unanimously.
Soon after, resident Diana Meale, who has been speaking to the council for months on the topic of water preservation, applauded them for their efforts to stem negative effects from droughts in the future.
The land sale agreement between Cross Farm Development, LLC and the town was brought up next, with attorney Morgan Hollis representing the developer. Upon explaining to the council the purpose of the agreement, which would have the town purchase and resell a small patch of land outside one of Cross Farm’s properties to Cross Farm so that they may create a new access way onto Route 102, Hollis was met with numerous questions from the council.
Councilor Joe Green noted that he failed to see the benefit of the purchase, while Vice Chair John Farrell hoped to see more efforts towards avoiding traffic on Adams Road, noting that it is “the only historic road in town.” Although some council members doubted the project, Dolan defended it, saying that the town should not “exert leverage we may not have” on the topic of traffic. The council is expected to hold one more discussion on the matter in a special meeting on June 29 at the town hall.
In other news, the council accepted a number of donations, including a $13,000 freightliner van from Ford of Londonderry, airport security and bullet proof vest program grants from the New Hampshire Department of Safety and U.S Department of Justice, and a $3,000 grant towards the Local Emergency Operations Plan for the Londonderry Fire Department, which the department also donated as well, bringing that to a total of $6,000 in grants. Fire Chief Darren O’Brien noted that Battalion Chief James Roger was responsible for gaining the $3,000 grant.
Once several local junk shops were granted licenses to operate by the council, the meeting was adjourned.