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HomeMy WebLinkAbout KMB 11/15/2017"Empowering residents, businesses, and government to make Mansfield a greener, cleaner place to live, work, and play" Meeting Minutes for Nov 15, 2017 7:00 pm Town Hall TOI&i RECD OFFICE 2818 FEB lb All: 19 MANSFIELD MAA SSACHUSETTS Attendees: Nancy Wall, Pat Colbert, Mike McCarthy, Martha O'Connell, Jason Dodd, and Jeff Ward Absent: Neil Rhein, Erik Bednarek, and Mike Healey KEEP MANSFIELD BEAUTIFUL Welcome & Call to Order Meeting called to order at 7:10. Minutes accepted from previous meeting and signed by Pat Colbert. Treasurer's report - Mike • We currently have $10,303.97 in the account, plus $532.66 in PayPal. • $500.00 was given to Keep Massachusetts Beautiful for social media communications services. Open Position - All Congratulations to Neil for being elected Selectman! We all agreed Neil will make an excellent Selectman and we wish him the best. Because Neil can no longer serve on our committee while being a Selectman, we have an open position. Nancy will research how to best advertise this new position. Plower barrels - Nancy and Pat This program continues to be successful, with 89 barrels along the downtown. Pat has ordered the pansies for next year. Ray and Alan at Patrick Lyons said depending on the weather, we might be able to plant them in late March or early April. This year we planted them in late April, a week before the cleanup. To address the issue with caterpillars and aphids on the summer wave petunias, we will be switching to angel begonias for the summer flowers. These are currently resistant to bugs and require no pruning/de-heading. Pat saw them in Boston in the fall and they were beautiful and thriving. It was discussed that perhaps these could go right into the fall and we would not need to provide the fall mums. We will have to see how it goes. • The self -watering liners were effective in the summer, but did not do as well in the fall. We were unable to plant the regular, large mums because the root ball is too big for the liner. We needed to go with smaller mums and they did not look that good. We need to evaluate the best location for these 6 self -watering liners next year. • Pat wrote a list of all the sponsors, number of barrels, and type of barrel (oak or plastic). This will help next year when delivering the barrels to the sponsors. • Some oak barrels will need to be retired. We will determine if we will replace them with the plastic ones, which have proven to be a good choice, or oak barrels that are now available at Home Depot. • The mums have been removed from the barrels. We are waiting for DPW to remove the barrels and store for the winter. Nancy is going to send out a reminder to Tracey. Pole Mounted Barrels - Nancy and Pat • The eight pole mounted barrels from the Non-profit gift fund have been installed. This should continue to help reduce litter downtown. Painted Barrels - Pat Pat is still waiting on two barrels; a dragon and CandyLand. One barrel will be delivered to Megan Crotty of Friends of Memorial Park. She will be painting a barrel for the new playground. There are two barrels left to be painted. Fall Litter Cleanup- All • This year the fall litter cleanup was not as successful as last year. Precinct 4 had a real good turnout and all of the main areas were covered, but the other precincts did not do as well. • We really need to target students looking for service hours and the fall sports participants. • Pat suggested we create a banner to better advertise this event. The spring banner we got last year was $450.00 from Bay State Envelope. Pat will write up a grant for a fall banner. • Nancy suggested we do a treasure hunt and have each precinct place an unusual piece of trash in some location. The person/group that finds the item will be given a gift card to a local business. This might be something we do for the spring cleanup as well! Anti -litter signs - All The anti -litter signs have proven to be effective, especially when they are grouped together. This year they were placed on Spring Street, County Street, Maple Street, and Stearns Avenue. We scattered them around on Stearns Avenue and they did not have the impact or same positive effect that they had in the other locations. Neil currently has the anti -litter signs. Jeff reported the Spring Street area that had the signs continues to look good. However, the person who was littering this area has now moved further down Spring Street. This might be the next location we target in the spring. No signs will be put out now due to winter. Adopt -a -Spot - Martha Martha sent out a thank you note to all Adopt -a -Spot participants. Martha will send out a note again to Kyle Guerrini asking his advice on the condition of the trees on the Route 106 embankment. Martha will specify that our committee will cover the cost of either spraying or replacing the damaged trees. The butterfly garden is all groomed at the J/J and ready to be planted in the spring. Our committee agreed to donate 2 butterfly bushes to the project to show our support and commitment to this project. We Noticed - Mike Mike setup a time to take a picture with the administrator from Sherman Jackson. However, due to work issues, she was not able to participate. Mike gave the plaque and got a picture of the landscaping. Nancy will follow-up with Mike on getting this in the paper. Summary of 2017 new programs /accomplishments - All What makes this committee so special is it continues to maintain all the existing programs, but also expands and creates new programs. Here is a list of the new things that were accomplished this year. • Placed all the trash and recycling from the spring cleanup at the Town Hall to create a statement. • Created and distributed anti -litter signs to key areas around town. • Expanded the downtown flower barrel program to include spring pansies and 6 new self -watering barrels. • Worked with J/J to help create a butterfly garden. • Participated in the March Madness event. • Participated in the Non -Profit gift fund reception. • Neil won as Selectman! Annual dinner at Cheng Du - All We will have our annual dinner at Cheng Du sometime in late January and early February. Date to be determined. To Do List Nanc Follow up with Tracey to have the flower barrels removed. Work with Mike to get We Noticed in the local papers. Determine how to advertise for open position in our committee. Pat When the time comes in early spring, write a grant for a new fall litter cleanup banner. Martha Write note to Kyle indicating the committee will cover the cost of spraying or replacing the trees on Route 106 embankment. Next meeting date is Thursday, February 15, 2018. Meeting adjourned at 8:45 Minutes approved on:at 7-A5 Secretary signature: