By Paul Conyers
The Utilities Committee was still establishing its procedures for the rest of the year at its June 6 meeting.
“Has everybody looked to set themselves up with a Londonderrynh.org email address?” asked Utilities Chair, Lynn Wiles. “I’m not sending any more emails out to private addresses because of the nature of the work we do, I want emails to be available in the public domain.”
Despite a push to limit emails to a town account, a few members continued having technical difficulties with their new accounts. Wiles promised to send out instructions to members on how to set up a government email account.
“We’re working in the public domain,” Wiles said, “We, as a community, need to get our act together in doing these things.”
A May proposal to create subcommittees was formalized from the planned unofficial meetups, following a legal recommendation formalizing every meeting. A subcommittee agenda will be posted at least 24 hours before any meeting with publically available minutes of each session to follow New Hampshire’s Right to Know law.
“The law is fairly clear that the public is entitled to know when subcommittees are meeting, so the public can attend when they want to,” said Town Manager, Mike Malaguti.
All subcommittees are designed to be relatively informal, advisory bodies to streamline work for the full Utilities Committee. Members emphasized that Londonderry residents are always welcome to attend subcommittee meetings if they have any ideas or concerns.
Subcommittees began operating with Michael Speltz for energy concerns in town and a promise to cover energy-related issues. The discussion focused on renewables, including two solar proposals from Twin States Clean Energy and Walden Renewables. Both companies have looked into building solar panels on town property. Twin States and Walden are not the only companies to make a pitch for solar in recent months.
“The problem is that every company seems to envision just leasing town land,” said Speltz, as Malaguti added, “I’m getting flooded with calls and solicitations from many solar companies. Some of the property is plainly inappropriate for what we want to do, and I just don’t have the bandwidth.”
Committee members agreed to look at all solar proposals going into the future and that more information was needed to determine whether Twin States and Walden have a viable proposition for Londonderry.
Another concern was water pressure on Mammoth Road after an engineering report found that the eight and sixteen-inch water lines might not have enough water pressure to keep up with demand in case of a large fire in the area.
“In Pennichuck’s Master Plan, it identifies that they do not have sufficient fire protection for a full build-out without a new water tank and better infrastructure,” reported Committee member Ray Breslin. “It’s why they’re building a new water tank up off Harvey Road, to supply water volume and pressure.”
Members agreed to invite Pennichuck to a later meeting to get a full picture of the situation.
The Utilities Committee is next scheduled to meet on Tuesday, July 20, in the Moose Hill Conference Room, starting at 7 p.m.