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Building projects, budget woes
and bottleneck congestion
~ A
look at what made headlines in Canton during the 2000s ~
By Jeffrey
Pickette
Citizen Staff
In an article
recapping the events of 2002, the
Citizen
proclaimed that “budget woes and building projects” dominated
the headlines that year. A year later, this paper dubbed 2003 as
“a year of progress — and traffic.”
But as
residents of this town are well aware, stories of budget woes,
building projects, traffic and progress were far from contained
to the events of the early part of the 2000s. In fact, after
looking back at the last ten years, it is fair to say that these
buzzwords helped to define this past decade in Canton history.
***
Perhaps
unbeknownst at the time, the
Citizen’s top
story in the very first issue of last decade — January 6, 2000 —
foreshadowed one of the major events of the last ten years:
construction on Washington Street.
While this
particular article dealt with plans to widen the street near its
intersection with Pleasant Street, it was the downtown area that
grabbed the majority of the headlines in the 2000s with the
underground wiring project and the Streetscape project that soon
followed.
April of 2003
marked the start of the first phase of the downtown underground
wiring project, which subsequently created gridlock on
Washington Street. Meanwhile, in August of 2003, plans were
approved to revamp the intersection at Washington and Pleasant
streets.
As a result,
“most citizens will likely remember 2003 as the year it often
took longer to drive from Crowell’s Market to the Village
Shoppes than it did to walk the same route,” Editor-in-Chief
Beth Erickson wrote in the 2003 year in review.
The work on
the Washington and Pleasant Street intersection was wrapped up
by the spring of 2004 “with little fanfare and better traffic
flow,” Kathy Anderson wrote in 2004. But the underground wiring
project continued, and after many delays, it was finally
finished in December of 2006 — just in time for another major
infrastructure project to break ground.
The
Streetscape project, which sought to bring a “New England
village” feel to the downtown area, started popping up in
headlines in 2004 when a design committee was appointed by the
Board of Selectmen.
The goal of
the project, which did not actually start until July of 2007,
was to ultimately make the downtown more aesthetically appealing
and more user-friendly for pedestrians, while making the commute
on Washington Street more efficient for motorists.
Along the way,
some downtown business owners and residents voiced feelings of
frustration and confusion, while all dealt with plenty of
construction-based traffic. After some delays, the project came
to an end in September of 2009.
While one of
the town’s major roadways was getting a facelift, some of the
town’s key municipal buildings were renovated. The new and
improved public library opened in December of 2003 and survived
some early growing pains when frigid temperatures in January of
2004 led to a broken water pipe, which subsequently led to its
temporary closing.
The Canton
Police Station opened its new headquarters at the site of the
former Eliot school in the spring of 2004, and the Canton High
renovation project, which got underway in 2003 and spanned three
years, brought the school into the 21st century,
providing students with a new cafeteria, auditorium, media
center, gymnasium and turf-field, not to mention fully-renovated
classrooms.
Local builder
John Marini added to this decade-long overhaul of Washington
Street as well with his Village at Forge Pond complex and his
Grover Estates development.
***
Town-wide
budget woes were certainly magnified as the national economy
tanked toward the end of this past decade, but the economy has
run hot and (mostly) cold over the last ten years, making
budgetary issues a consistent concern.
As early as
2001, financial problems led to the brief delay of both the
library and high school renovation projects. In 2002 the town
dealt with rising health insurance costs and a decrease in local
aid from the state, and in 2004 the
Citizen
reported that the School Committee “struggled throughout the
spring with whether or not to cut services, expand user fees, or
both.” Either the 2002 or the 2004 dilemma could have just as
easily been lifted from last week’s paper.
With financial
problems deepening, the town went to vote for a $3.95 million
override of Proposition 2 ½ in January of 2007, but the measure
failed to pass by a slim margin of just over 300 votes.
Yet, voters
went back to the polls in a special election in May of 2008 and
this time approved of a $4.5 million override, which provided
much-needed funding for school and municipal services. However,
just months later, “an impending economic recession would
threaten to erase the progress that had been made,” Jay Turner
wrote in the Citizen
last January.
With budget
cuts looming in 2010, perhaps the full impact of the override
never materialized.
***
Construction
and budget cuts were far from the only recurring news stories
during the last ten years. One of the more heartwarming themes
of this decade has been the efforts of Tony Andreotti, the
town’s veterans agent, in organizing a number of moving tributes
to veterans, both living and deceased.
It started
with Andreotti organizing “Operation Recognition” in 2000, a
program which presented high school diplomas to Canton’s World
War II veterans who left school before graduation to serve in
the war. A similar program was held a year later for Korean War
veterans.
In 2004,
Andreotti spearheaded the effort to move all of the town’s war
monuments to one location at the Canton Corner Cemetery. In
September of 2005, the traveling Vietnam Memorial Wall came to
Canton, and in 2007 and 2009, Andreotti organized Veterans Day
breakfasts honoring WWII (2007) and Korean War (2009) veterans.
But, arguably
Andreotti’s lasting legacy is the implementation of the Fallen
Heroes sign program — the white signs with green writing placed
atop select street signs in town. There are 77 signs in all that
have gone up this decade, honoring Canton’s fallen veterans from
the Civil War, WWI, WWII, Korean War, Vietnam War and Iraq War.
***
Bob Burr, John
Connolly, Victor Del Vecchio, Avril Elkort and Sal Salvatori
have all sat on the Board of Selectmen since 2004, but in the
early part of this decade, they were at times political
opponents.
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The Board
of Selectmen went from three to five members in 2004. (L-R) Sal
Salvatori, Avril Elkort, Victor Del Vecchio, John Connolly and
Bob Burr are pictured following the 2004 town election.
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In the 2001
town election, Connolly held off a challenge from Del Vecchio
and in 2003 Elkort edged Salvatori by 213 votes. Del Vecchio was
elected to the BOS in 2002 when longtime selectman George
Jenkins did not seek reelection and Salvatori, along with Burr,
were both elected to the board in 2004 when the BOS expanded
from three seats to five.
Other news
makers that came to power in the 2000s include Fire Chief Tim
Ronayne, who replaced Jim Fitzpatrick in 2001; John Ciccotelli,
who became director of public health in 2003; Mike Trotta, who
became the DPW superintendent in 2003; and Ken Berkowitz, who
became the chief of the Canton Police Department in January of
2005 after former police chief Peter Bright retired at the end
of 2004.
Dr. Irene
Kaplan replaced Allen Brown as superintendent of schools in
2001. She was subsequently replaced by Dr. John D’Auria in 2007.
With Ronayne
retiring in 2009 and being succeeded by former Deputy Chief
Charlie Doody, and with D’Auria and Assistant Superintendent
Alan Dewey set to retire, a new group of leaders figure to shape
the events for the beginning of this decade.
***
Canton also
lost its share of influential citizens and leaders over the past
ten years.
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Billy Armando
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Joyce Feely,
who dedicated part of her life to helping the victims of the
Chernobyl nuclear disaster, lost her own battle with cancer in
2001 at the age of 67; Winnie Withington, who at 105 was the
town’s oldest resident, died in 2002; and longtime animal
control officer Dick Stein died of cancer in 2004 at the age of
62.
Michael Uliano,
42, was a victim of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks,
and Marine Corps Lance Corporal Shayne Cabino, a 2004 graduate
of CHS, was killed in action in Iraq.
And then
there’s town legends Charlie Tolias (2003), Francis X. Callahan
(2005), Samuel Swardlick (2006), Billy Armando (2007), Ed Lynch
(2008), and Paul Matthews (2009), whose memories are now carried
on by various monuments, landmarks, buildings, or scholarships
and awards that bear their respective names.
***
Not every
story has a long-lasting impact. Some, like the flock of wild
turkeys that made Chapman Street its home for a few months in
2005, are light-hearted. Some, like the appearance of “Boston
Rob” Mariano on the CBS hit reality series Survivor, featured a
Canton resident during his or her 15 minutes of fame.
While others,
like the fate of the Plymouth Rubber property (and the historic
Revere buildings on site) or the fate of the Westwood Station
development, dominated headlines in the latter part of the
decade but were put on hold or cast aside as larger issues, like
the crumbling national economy, took center stage.
It is unknown
what this next decade has in store. Budgetary concerns figure to
shape local headlines for the foreseeable future. Perhaps the
Plymouth Rubber and Westwood Station stories will resurface.
As for
gridlock on Washington Street, that’s one story residents hope
won’t make a comeback anytime soon.
January 14, 2010
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