Easton voters OK smoking ban on town land

By a margin of 69-39, voters Monday night backed the Board of Health in its quest to include town-owned land as a public place where smoking is prohibited. It was the only article out of 48 that drew any type of discussion at the two-hour meeting. Places like the town pool and the new ball fields on Chestnut Street would now be smoke free, according to health agent Mark Taylor, who said the bylaw amendment would promote a healthy lifestyle and keep people from being exposed to second-hand smoke.

Some residents questioned whether the measure is enforceable. “The Police Department became involved because kids are smoking across the street from the high school (on conservation land),” Krajcik said. “It gives the school resource officer the ability to positively intervene, talk to the kids, maybe talk to the parents. We’re not going to balance the budget by ticketing these things.” Members of the Conservation Commission were against the measure with John Grant calling it presumptuous to have another board make rules and regulations on Conservation Commission controlled land.

“There are over 5,000 acres in town,” Grant said. “It’s not possible for you to police this. It doesn’t need policing.” Resident Janice Gilman said she thought it was a school issue that did not merit town intervention. “I don’t think a police officer should tell students not to smoke. That’s the parents’ job. (The police) have more important things to do,” Gilman said. Voters also passed the town’s $67.4 million operating budget that includes the School Department’s $33.8 million budget, a 2.3 percent increase over last year’s budget, according to town administrator David Colton.

The budget also adds one police officer, two firefighters, fully staffs the public safety dispatchers and partially restores some clerical hours cut at Town Hall, particularly in the collector/treasurer office. Community Preservation Act expenditures were also approved with $70,000 going to repair the roof on the children’s wing of the Ames Free Library, $38,567 to repair masonry and siding on the Children’s Museum of Easton, $120,900 to fix the chimneys and stonewall at the Town Hall, and $500,000 to purchase a preservation restriction for the Governor Ames Estate that will be repaid by a grant awarded to the town in that same amount.