Wayland selectmen move to draft remote-participation article for Town Meeting

WAYLAND -- November 16, 2020, Wayland selectmen back remote Town Meeting participation, tap interim police chief. The Board of Selectmen on Nov. 16 reached a sense-of-the-meeting agreement authorizing Town Administrator Louise Miller to engage town counsel on draft special-act language allowing remote participation in open Town Meeting, and previewed the Nov. 23 ratification of Lt. Sean Gibbons as interim police chief upon Chief Robert Swanik's Nov. 30 retirement. The board voted 5-0 to release Dec. 17, 2018 executive-session minutes under an Attorney General order. Miller said Wayland has filed roughly $1.2 million in CARES Act reimbursements for town COVID expenses through Dec. 30, with $600,000 more for schools. ELVIS chair Dennis Berry urged framing the initiative as "remote participation," not remote voting, saying members cannot "just pop in and vote." Only one fiscal 2022 increase surfaced under selectmen jurisdiction: a $6,000 conservation land-management request.