Use this search box to find articles that have run in our newspapers over the last several years.
Date: 6/14/2022
WARE – The Ware Board of Selectmen met to discuss and oversee a variety of agenda items including a presentation of the Age and Dementia-Friendly Ware report at their June 7 meeting.
The report was given by Senior Planner for the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission Becky Basch. According to Basch, it is important to plan for an aging population because the number of people over age 65 is projected to outnumber children under 18 nationwide by 2035.
The report consisted of a community assessment and action plan.
According to Basch, the Planning Commission did a Ware Livable Community Survey, attended events at the Senior Center and did working group meetings with the Council on Aging, the Library, Housing Authority and more.
She addressed the areas of concern based on the Ware Livable Community Survey that the town should address in the next five years.
The priority items were health and caregiver services, housing and financial security. The second priority items were transportation, financial security and food security.
In order to help Ware achieve being an Age and Dementia-Friendly town, she discussed action plan priorities.
The first was increasing dementia awareness and support. This will include implementing trainings for municipal staff, emergency personnel and business owners on how to recognize signs of dementia, connecting family caregivers with support programs and opportunities to connect with other caregivers and providing programming for people with dementia and their caregivers.
The second priority was housing. This will include assisting homeowners in accessing home modification loans and grant programs, developing a housing needs assessment, or housing production plan and exploring alternative housing models.
After discussing all the priorities, Basch told the board the next steps the town should take. They will have to sign the Dementia-Friendly pledge, submit a community assessment and action plan to AARP and Dementia-Friendly Massachusetts and the Age and Dementia-Friendly Action Team will continue to meet to oversee the implementation of the action plan.
Next on the agenda was reviewing new progress with the Quarry Street Flood Mitigation.Several residents came out to voice their frustrations with this project. According to them, no progress has been made and the flooding continues to get worse with each storm.
One resident said that this flooding has been an issue since 1998.
She noted how the town had started to fix it back then, but something went wrong which caused them to stop and never start again.
The board asked Town Manager Stuart Beckley to get an opinion from the new DPW director on what the next steps should be. However, they want to make sure that this will be a state-funded project and not a town-funded project as it was “caused by the state’s problem.”
Beckley will also have town engineers review the flooding issue and come up with a plan. He said that it could take anywhere from three to four months for them to come up with the proper engineering necessary for this issue.
The board also discussed board and committee raises and wages. According to Beckley, the town has reviewed several other town wages of municipal boards and committees and found that Ware’s Board of Health is underpaid.
The Board of Selectmen voted to raise their pay up to the average salary and then implement an average percentage increase of raises for all boards every year. This will make sure all boards are on a level playing field moving forward.
Those interested in viewing the Board of Selectmen meeting in its entirety are encouraged to visit the WareTV page.