IPSWICH – The Special Town Meeting last week approved all articles, honored a native son, who has been a policeman for 32 years, chief for 17, and put cats on notice that they may not be rowdy.
The cat bylaw, which passed 140 to 18, placed cats on an even keel with dogs, creating rules for the owners of annoying and dangerous cats like those dogs face. Police and the animal control officer can now order Ipswich residents to keep their cats under control. It does not authorize the town to euthanize cats.
The need for a cat bylaw came about when police were called to a home where a cat had attacked people, other animals and tried to enter a home other than its own. Police Chief Paul Nikas said he was surprised that Ipswich did not have a bylaw to control belligerent felines.
Nikas, a native of Ipswich, received a standing ovation, at the suggestion of SelectBoard chair Michael Doughtery, not for the cat bylaw, but for serving the town as a police officer for more than three decades, rising in rank to the pinnacle of the department.
Most of the other measures before this Town Meeting stirred little controversy. Town Meeting members agreed to pay the tuition for one more student at Essex Tech Vocational High School. Another eliminated the mandatory age limit for police officers.
The 29.2-acre Candlewood Golf Course was sold to Greenbelt with a permanent land restriction against development on 26.2 acres. It cost the town $850,000 to protect the land on Essex Road, but the state is providing $350,000 to reduce the cost to the town.
The property lies within a protection area near two town wells, which are critical public water sources, and is in one of the town’s most scenic corridors.
The Town Meeting authorized the Select Board to acquire easements across the neighboring Ascension Memorial Episcopal Church parking lot to relocate a wastewater pump station on the town’s property at 25 Green St.
Town Manager Brendan Sweeney told the SelectBoard this week he is budgeting for three Town Meetings next year, as opposed to two this year.
