Select Board Recap June 1, 2026

Hello Dartmouth, Cody Haddad, town administrator here. Going to give a recap of the June 1st select board meeting.

We started off the night with a pretty exciting event where we recognized the participants of the town's first citizens academy. We had about 25 individuals, residents of the community, take part in our 8-week course. They they learned all about the various workings of our town, all of the departments, each of our department heads came in and provided a presentation, answered questions from DCTB

to building department to the town clerk, the public schools, both Dartmouth public schools and Greater New Bedford Voc-Tech, DPW. Really was a quite immersive experience. We visited seven different locations, public buildings throughout the community, the libraries.

And so the select board acknowledged them and gave them some certificates of completion. Really got some great feedback and we look forward to running the program again going forward. So if you're interested in the citizens academy, we'll be running that again later this year. So stay tuned.

We also had a great introduction of our new director of environmental affairs, Jennifer Miller.

Mark Garrett, our former our former environmental affairs director, retired and Jennifer was selected as part of the committee, the hiring committee, and Jennifer has started with the town. So it was great to have an introduction for the public to see, also for the select board to see. Jennifer is is highly experienced, highly qualified, and we're very excited to have her on board here in Dartmouth.

The third item really went in in line with the introduction of Jennifer, where the town has a representative to the Buzzards Bay Action Committee.

And so Jennifer, as the director of environmental affairs, will represent the town on that in in all of the inner workings of what that committee does. Hopefully some resiliency grants and some regional efforts that the town can can part in.

Uh the sale off was looking for an entertainment license, uh which is at 246 Elm Street. Uh they the board unanimously approved that entertainment license. They're looking to have either solo or duet uh performers, um you know, kind of guitars, low-key music uh for the bar type atmosphere, relaxing, low-key. Uh Anchor Rock Vineyard's another uh request for an entertainment license. They are uh

the new vineyard located at 205 Bakerville Road. They are looking for an entertainment license as well, uh similar in that they are looking for to do solo and duet uh performances, and the select board unanimously approved that.

There was also a request for a common vehicular license for the new New York Bagel uh at 571 Dartmouth Street. And so, uh the select board granted the New York Bagel their their common vic license.

Um the select board also represent it or selected a representative to the joint transportation planning group. This is a regional group um that we appoint Tim Barber, our director of public works, to. We appoint our senior engineer Paul Duarte to serve on this as well as an as an alternate.

Uh and essentially, they're responsible for the biggest responsibility that this group has is they review and approve the TIP, which is the transportation improvement plan, um which goes to the state for funding for for large large-scale transportation projects throughout uh the region. So, the board approved Mr.

Barber and Mr. Duarte.

We also approved the new environmental preferred procurement policy. This is a requirement that the state has that we update and approve this policy, that the select board does so. Um it's a requirement of some grant funding that we get, a recycling grants for several thousand dollars. Essentially, what the policy says is we'll do our best to uh purchase recycled materials, not

be wasteful. It's pretty straightforward and it's actually pretty um common sense. Very exciting was we had an engineering firm in to go over the results of a feasibility study taking place at Apponagansett and Dias Landing.

So really that whole Apponagansett point to look at is the town really maximizing its use. What is the best use for the area as a whole?

And also recognizing that we need to mitigate some sea level rise concerns, climate change concerns. As as many of you are aware, anytime we have significant tidal storms down there, much of the the park and the point get does get flooded. The seawall, the existing seawall on the Dias Landing parking side is heavily eroded. And so we we want to make sure that we're preserving that for

our community to use in the future. The presentation The full presentation can be viewed in the select board meeting.

But overall, they presented some really exciting opportunities that we plan to try to move forward with in several phases.

In particular, we're going to we use this as a baseline to start pursuing grant funding to actually implement those improvements and provide a higher quality product to our community. So very exciting going items going on there.

We also appointed parking enforcement. So our two members of our parks and recreation/facilities team were appointed parking enforcement.

Primarily, this will take place down at at the town's public beaches. However, the appointment does not preclude them from enforcing parking town wide. So very a good thing going on there. SRPED, which is the Southeastern Regional Planning and Economic Development District, the local planning agency, the town has representatives that serve on that. We are currently still without an assistant

town administrator who has historically served in that role. So Melanie Perry, the executive assistant here in my office, will be serving on the SRPED commission and representing the town, which we're very excited about.

Unfortunately, our HR director, Suzanne Cunningham, is leaving the town of Dartmouth.

She has resigned from her position. So, her last day will be in early July. With that, we are recruiting for a new HR director.

And we requested that two select board members serve on the interview team.

The board had some discussion on this.

They praised Ms. Cunningham for her accomplishments in the year that she was here.

And also selected Nate Silva and Shawn McDonald to serve on the interview committee team, I should say, with Heidi Silverbrook serving as an alternate if one of them cannot make it.

So, we'll be conducting interviews. We hope to present a finalist to the select board for ratification.

Hopefully within the next month or so.

We also prepared for town meeting as everyone is aware town meeting was held on June 2nd, the day after the select board meeting. General discussion and preparation. There wasn't a lot to discuss regarding this. I think that the select board has done an excellent job of staying informed and being prepared.

And so, this was really just an item that we put on the agenda in case there was any final discussion before we entered town meeting.

The last item on the select board agenda had to do with the possible revocation of appointment of Mr. Andrew Sponberg from the Russells Mills Historic District Commission.

Unfortunately, recently the Russells Mills Historic District Commission has committed several open meeting law violations, several ethics violations, which is actually uh They broke the law under the ethics law.

And so, the select board really was concerned that that is not something that we want the town doing. As a result, what essentially has happened is the Russells Mills Historic District Commission met privately. They had phone calls, email conversations, which is in direct violation of the open meeting law. And they authorized a lawsuit, which was not legal because they didn't have it in a in a regular meeting.

Everything that we do in government and particularly here in the town of Dartmouth in Massachusetts, we're transparent. We follow the open meeting law, and we want our residents to know what's going on. And so, this was in direct contradiction to that, and the select board was really concerned.

As a result, the town has spent thousands and thousands of dollars on this improper litigation that was filed.

And the board did essentially determine that that was not something that they were going to accept. And so, they did vote to immediately suspend Mr. Spawnberg with the idea that he be removed per the provisions of the charter.

our next regular select select board meeting will be June 15th.

We did have to change that. Initially, it was scheduled for June 22nd. We'll be meeting on June 15th. There after, it won't be again until July 13th.

So, thank you for tuning in. We'll see you soon.