Act One: All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players
In December of 2022, the SPS School Committee was gearing up to pursue an override for FY24. Come January of 2023, the SPS School Committee was in a joint meeting with the Sudbury Select Board insisting that they had asked…
In May of 2022 a Citizen Petition passed at Sudbury’s Annual Town Meeting after much debate. The petition called for the Town to hire a Sustainability Director, declare a climate emergency, and begin long-term planning for sustainability, among other action items.
Prior to the 2022 Annual Town Meeting, the Select Board requested a legal…
Sudbury is known for its green space, its history and its schools, among many other wonderful things. One thing the town isn't known for is wireless coverage. Online community forums are frequently peppered with requests for recommendations on cell carriers, and there's never a clear winner in the comments. So what exactly is going on…
On Wednesday, the Rail Trails Advisory Committee (RTAC) met after recently completing a walk of the proposed route of Phase 3 of the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail. That's the section that runs from the intersection with the Mass Central Rail Trail at Union Road and Station Road and continues south to the Framingham border. …
On Tuesday the Select Board discussed the Sewataro financials, as they received the contractually-required annual reporting from the camp operator recently. The full report is on page 10 of the Select Board packet.
Per the latest version of the contract, the camp operator pays $200,000 each year in rent, which is up this year from $120,000 in…
On Monday the Sudbury Public Schools School Committee met, and MCAS results were back on the agenda. You can watch the presentation at 1:20:00, but the slides were also included in the packet for the meeting.
A big focus in the presentation was a comparison to 2019 results. Apparently something happened in 2020 that may have…
The State passed legislation commonly referred to as "MBTA Communities" back in 2021. The specifics of that legislation are not exactly common knowledge, and that's likely because zoning legislation is insufferably boring quite technical and requires a good deal of context to understand exactly what the impact will be in the real-world. Here's the best we can…
In their last meeting, the Community Preservation Committee (CPC) sent a warning to applicants. They wanted more detail and more substance. In this week's public hearing it was clear that several applicants got the memo, and they brought the thunder.
The two applications with the broadest interest are probably the Community Gardens…
Sudbury Town Clerk, Beth Klein, recently requested that the Select Board vote to opt out of vote-by-mail/mail-in voting in the upcoming 2024 Annual Town Election (ATE). (Page 30) The VOTES Act of 2022 gives the Select Board the authority to opt out of mail-in voting. Klein joined the Select Board meeting on Tuesday to explain…
On Tuesday, Sudbury Town Manager Andy Sheehan presented the financial condition of the Town. The short version is that forecasts aren't perfect, but the Town is forecasting some possible challenges in the coming fiscal years. You can jump to page 36 here to review the slides. (1:12:50)
Sheehan noted that budget guidance in future…