Chester board talks forest management, finishes annual appointments

By Shawn Cunningham
© Telegraph Publishing LLC

Last Wednesday’s Chester Select Board meeting was partly made up of the re-organizational housekeeping that follows each year’s March Town Meeting but also looked toward the future and the work that  the town needs to do.

Windsor County Forester Hannah Dallas came before the board to discuss the Chester Town Forest management plan, which was approved by the board in 2013 and is in effect until 2028. Dallas noted that work has fallen a bit behind and asked the board what it wanted to do. The 550-acre Town Forest is located west of downtown off Reservoir Road.

The board and Dallas then began to discuss timber sales, which would benefit the town’s water department. Several board members also pointed to the efficiency of having some “non-commercial” work done in the forest if loggers would be in there anyway. This would include maintenance on the two recreational hiking trails

They also discussed the timeframe in which to harvest timber to get the best return from the sales based on market prices. Board member Arianna Knapp said that the board could give Dallas leeway to do her job and the rest of the board agreed.

The board also briefly discussed a packet of information on Class 4 roads including model policies for handling them. They decided to address the issue at a later board meeting to give members time to digest the information at hand. Board member Arne Jonynas said that the situations in Smokeshire and Wyman’s Falls, where land owners had been upset by the public use of ancient roads, had precipitated looking at these town assets.

Appointments large and small

On the housekeeping front, the board quickly appointed or reappointed a number of officers that have some responsibility and authority behind them, and a few that don’t. The weightiest of these was designating Aimee O’Brien as Town Clerk for one year. O’Brien will replace current Town Clerk Deb Aldrich when she steps down at the end of April. O’Brien’s term begins on April 30. There will be a retirement party for Aldrich from 5 to 7 p.m. on Saturday April 26 at the American Legion Post on Route 103.

Each year a list of appointments are made for offices like Pound Keeper and Animal Control Officer as well as Regional Planning Rep, Green Up Day coordinator and Tree Warden.

Some of these are filled by town employees in the course of their regular work while others are done by volunteers and a few may be vacant based on a lack of time or interest. Then there are the ancient offices that have little or no authority but remain in statute and are taken up by traditionalists. These include weigher of coal, inspectors of wood and shingles and fence viewers. The last still can have some authority in the case of boundary disputes.  The board unanimously approved the list of appointments which you can find here.

In addition to the office appointments, the board heard from several people who had put their names forward to serve on one of several town committees that had vacancies. After hearing from the candidates and later discussing them in an executive session, the board made the following appointments and their terms.

Citizen Advisory Committee:  Vincent Buckholtz, 3 year; Mandy Lindsay, 3 year;  Barry Fowler, 1 year; Mike LeClair, 1 year.

Housing Commission: Joe Karl, 3 year; Sharon Baker, 3 year; Bryan Santiago, 3 year, Courtlandt Pennell, Alternate 1 year.

Cannabis Control Commission: Arianna Knapp, 3 year; Charles Baird, 3 year.

Planning Commission: Scott MacDonald, 3 year; Carl Henshaw, 1 year; Jeff Holden, 3 year.

Development Review Board: Harry Goodell, 3 year; Phil Perlah, 3 year.

Paper of Record

For a number of years, the board has been appointing two papers of record. In a way, this is the recognition of the change in which people today get their news, with many older folks leaning toward reading a physical paper and younger people finding their news online. So again this year, Chester has two papers of record – the online only The Chester Telegraph and the printed Vermont Journal.

At times, some have expressed confusion over what it means to be a “paper of record.” In effect it means that the paper of recordwill publish notices from the town that the town is legally required to publish. By designating a paper of record, residents know exactly where to go to find these notices.