Tisbury select board members said Tuesday they are open to allowing state highway work to continue on Beach Road for another month, instead of requiring the Massachusetts Department of Transportation to suspend operations for the summer beginning this week, as previously agreed.
Town administrator John (Jay) Grande told the board MassDOT has a list of objectives it wants to achieve before the summer break, including line painting requested by the town as well as cleaning the roadway and catch basins, tree trimming, saltwater marsh mitigation and underground utility work.
“They want until June 24,” Mr. Grande said. “I’m sure they would like more.”
According to the state, he said, postponing the utility work now could lead to a delay of more than a year in the project timeline.
“I know we’re all anxious to see the roadway repaired, reconstructed, with new sidewalks — I won’t go through the litany,” Mr. Grande said.
Board members said they were open to extending the seasonal deadline, but asked for more specifics on the work to be done and insisted the road be cleaned before the coming Memorial Day weekend.
“If they don’t want to sweep it before this weekend, then I want them to allow us to sweep it,” board chairman James Rogers said. “The businesses have gone through quite a lot down there. It’s a short season for our business people to make money,” he added.
Mr. Grande said he would make sure Mass DOT receives the message.
“We’re open to their needs, but we need to have the details and we need to have some assurances that businesses won’t be impeded,” he said.
The Beach Road project has been plagued by problems for months, including tensions between the town and the state over responsibilities for various aspects of the work. A recent testy exchange took place over pothole repairs on the half-mile stretch of roadway that has been a construction site since late last fall.
But on Tuesday select board member Jeff Kristal said the relationship between the town and the DOT has been positive.
“They’ve been good partners in this,” he said. “There’s no animosity.”
Mr. Grande echoed the assessment.
“We work closely together,” he said. “We have issues that arise, and the whole thing is to work through them . . . we’re pretty direct people and we don’t mince words, and we try to get to a good place.”
In other business Tuesday, Mr. Rogers said the annual Memorial Day parade will go ahead after all, following the latest state guidelines on Covid-19. The parade steps off from the American Legion Hall at 10:30 a.m. Monday, and marches to the Oak Grove Cemetery.
It was announced earlier in the week that the Memorial Day town picnic at the Tashmoo overlook will not be held for a second year,
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