The Lincoln Squirrel – News, features and photos from Lincoln, Mass.

Donelan’s employee qualifies for world-class ski event

Erica Cyr at her post at the checkout at Donelan’s.

By Maureen Belt

Erica Cyr was seven years old when her parents outfitted her in skis and started her on downhill runs at Blue Hills Ski Area. She showed such promise that her father signed her up for a ski camp at Wachusett Mountain, a 90-minute ride each way from their Dorchester home.

The long car rides paid off as Cyr, now 39 and well-known in Lincoln for her friendy demeanor as a cashier at Donelan’s, recently qualified as a women’s alpine skier at the 2022 Special Olympics World Winter Games in Kazan, Russia.

“I’m very excited,” she said.

The games are scheduled to begin in February 2022 but, like just about everything else, are contingent on the state of the pandemic. The delegates will meet July 7 to decide if the games will be held. Cyr is hopeful for a green light not just for herself but the other athletes as well. “Everyone on my ski team has worked really hard,” she said.

If the games are on, Cyr, who now lives in Concord, will spend two weeks in Russia with her mother Betty Pettit, her father Jim Cyr, and her stepfather, all avid skiers. Heidi, her beloved goldendoodle, will mind the fort while she’s away.

Cyr’s earned her place on the Olympic roster earlier this month with two medal wins at Snowmass Ski Area in Aspen: the giant slalom and the super G. She also took first in the Vertical Challenge at Nashoba Valley Ski Area in February. And despite not yet knowing if she will be traveling abroad, she remains devoted to her training. Alpine ski racing is a demanding sport that requires physical and mental discipline, and she meets these requirements through workouts on and off the slopes.

Erica Cyr at the NASTAR National Championships at Aspen Snowmass in Colorado on April 5.

When snow is on the ground, Cyr dons her atomic Redster skis and trains locally at Nashoba, Wachusett Mountain, and Gunstock. She spends a few weeks every February and April in Aspen with coaches Joanie Valentine and Becky Wilson, and she gets her cardio exercise at home on her elliptical and stationery bike, where she also lifts weights. 

Mental stamina comes naturally. “I never get scared,” she said.

Focus, not fear, gets her through races at the local and national levels. “What goes through my head when I’m racing is that I want to try and get a medal, and if I don’t, that’s OK,” she said. “I can’t win all the medals all the time, so it will give someone else a chance.”

Before her recent silver-medal slalom performance, contestants and their coaches were allowed to inspect the course. Cyr and Valentine noted an abundance of hairpin turns, meaning Cyr would have to cut dangerously close to the gates without knocking any over or skipping any. There was no room for error, so she didn’t allow herself to make any.

“I really took my time and concentrated,” she said of the challenge. Armed with this winning mindset, Cyr swished past each gate straight to the podium.

Even if she weren’t a dedicated grocery employee, Cyr knows the importance of nutrition for elite athletes. “I eat lots of protein,” she said. Fish is the main go-to, and she supplements with shakes. 

As fearless off the slopes as on, Cyr is especially honored to be considered a frontline essential worker during the Covid-19 pandemic. “I find it very rewarding,” she said.

Cyr began at Donelan’s as a cashier five years ago. “The customers there are very nice,,” she said, adding she finds it flattering that they check in with her manager if she’s out for an extended period of time.

“They’ll ask, ‘Where’s Erica? Is she OK?’ And he’ll say, ‘She’s OK. Everything is fine, she’s just in Colorado at a ski race right now.’” Cyr is a longtime member of NASTAR (a grassroots program whose handicap system that lets recreational ski racers to compete and compare scores), so there’s a good chance she’s racing for a medal when not ringing in groceries. 

Cyr works at Donelan’s year-round and adds another part-time job in the summer. Until last year, she worked as an assistant counselor at Drumlin Farm. The pandemic nixed the 2020 season, and just like the possibility of going to the Olympics, she has to wait and see if there will be campers to counsel this year. When she is training in Colorado, she helps Wilson and Valentine coach the racing team of seven- and eight-year-old boys.

When not skiing, working the register, or spoiling Heidi, Cyr enjoys everything from choral singing to spending a Saturday night with friends at Kimball Farm. July 7, the day the delegates decide if the Special Olympics are on, is heavy on her mind, as is where to put any new medals. 

“Well,” she admitted, “I guess those are good problems to have.”  

Correction

The May 2 article headlined “Property tax proposal is topic of Monday night presentation” included an incorrect figure for shifting the total tex levy in years two and three in the proposed Property Tax Extended Circuit Breaker Program. The correct figure is 1.0%, not 1.5%. The article also should have specified that not every homeowner over 65 will be eligible, but only those who meet the state’s income limits. Also, the five-year residency requirement has always been part of the committee’s recommendation bu differs from the 10 years required by some other towns. Otherwise, the proposed program is identical to the one that has been offered in Sudbury since 2014.

 

My Turn: All those eligible should get the Covid-19 vaccination

By Chris Eliot

While many Americans have now been vaccinated against Covid-19, it is critical to vaccinate everyone who is medically eligible. Most estimates indicate 60-70% of the population must be vaccinated to reach herd immunity. Historically, approximately 10-15% of the population cannot take a vaccine for medical reasons. There is no approved vaccine for children, which are about 20% of the population. Adding up these numbers leaves no room for anyone to choose not to get the vaccine.

I am in favor of making the vaccine mandatory, but there are many prior steps that can be taken. We should create a shared incentive to get vaccinated by connecting relaxation of social distancing restrictions directly to vaccination rates. Currently, there is a highly opaque political process for deciding when to open up theaters, restaurants, and other areas, and this strange system does little to really encourage public acceptance of vaccination.

Instead, there should be specific advertised policy changes tied numerically to local vaccination rates. For example, when 50% of the medically eligible population in a community is vaccinated, there should be no requirement to wear masks outside. When 60% of the medically eligible population in a community is vaccinated, more businesses should be open at higher levels. The restrictions should be lifted in increments as 70%, 80%, 90%, and 95% of the medically eligible population of a community are vaccinated. This process would directly connect everyone’s contribution to public health measures to a tangible set of rewards. People would have a chance to take specific actions to achieve the common goals, empowering the population.

I believe this kind of measure is necessary for us to reach full vaccination and end the Covid pandemic.

Eliot is a computer scientist with a background in medical teaching software and chair of the Hanscom Field Advisory Commission.

“My Turn” is a forum for readers to offer their views on any subject of interest to other Lincolnites. Submissions must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Items will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Submissions containing personal attacks, errors of fact, or other inappropriate material will not be published.

Property tax proposal is topic of Monday night presentation

A proposal to redistribute property taxes to help homeowners with limited means and property values is the subject of a Zoom presentation on Monday, May 3 at 7 p.m.

At the upcoming Annual Town Meeting on May 15, voters will be asked to approve a home-rule petition to the state legislature that would allow Lincoln to create a local Property Tax Extended Circuit Breaker Program. If approved, the program would limit the percentage of income a homeowner would have to pay in property taxes based on their income, assets, length of time in town, and age (65+). Funding would come from a small across-the-board tax rate increase. 

The Property Tax Study Committee was formed in 2019 to look at ways to ease the burden on limited-income residents and preserve economic diversity after the town raised property taxes by almost 15% to pay for the $93 million school project. The issue was discussed at the State of the Town Meeting in November 2019 and was slated for a vote at Annual Town Meeting, but that meeting was postponed and stripped of nonessential warrant articles as the Covid-19 pandemic took hold.

Last year’s postponed proposal would have applied to renters as well as homeowners, “but we don’t have an easy mechanism for implementing this kind of a program for renters — we don’t have that [financial] connection with them as we do with homeowners,” Selectman Jennifer Glass said when she recapped the plan at an April 26 board meeting. To track more closely to other towns’ programs, Lincoln’s plan applies to homeowners over 65 who meet the state’s income limits and those who have lived in town for five years, rather than the 10 years specified by some other towns. Otherwise, the proposed program is identical to the one that has been offered in Sudbury since 2014.

“We want our home rule petition to be as familiar to the legislature as possible” to maximize its chances of passage, Glass said. Sudbury, Concord, and Wayland have already enacted local versions of the state circuit breaker program.

To qualify for the plan, a house must not exceed Lincoln’s average single-family property value plus 10%. The plan would be funded by shifting up to 0.5% of the total tax levy in the first year, and 1.0% in years two and three. The program would have to be reauthorized at Town Meeting every three years.

Phase 2 of the effort to limit the tax burden on some seniors will involve establishing a task force to look at the town’s social services and come up with a long-range plan for  social svcs and det LR plan for supporting the community’s needs.

In 2019, the committee initially floated a residential tax exemption as well as the circuit-breaker proposal, but it was shelved after residents at a public forum were cool to the idea. That proposal would have exempted a certain percentage of the value of everyone’s property, meaning that the tax burden would shift toward those with higher-value homes to benefit those with homes at the lower end of the value range.

Lincoln’s efforts to thwart cut-through traffic go way back

By Kerry Glass

One way to keep out traffic: Don’t tell travelers where the roads are.

For the first 75 years after Lincoln was founded, the town felt no need for an official road map. The roads ran where Lincoln residents needed them, and new roads were created and old ones were closed by debate and decision in Lincoln’s town meetings. The road “maps” were scrawled descriptions by the town clerk in town records: “beginning at Lexington line, so running southerly over John Headley’s land and through Joseph Brooks’ land, the said Brooks to have liberty to hang a gate on the said way at his southerly bounds.”

Then in 1794, the Great and General Court required all towns to submit “accurate plans” of their borders, rivers, bridges, and roads. But only county roads had to be shown on these maps. So that is all that Samuel Hoar, the town surveyor, included when he drew up the town’s official map—just four county roads, one in north Lincoln and three in south Lincoln. It was not until 1830 that the Commonwealth required towns to submit maps showing all town roads. Lincoln had no choice and finally produced a complete road map. Yet even on this map, no names were shown for the roads (that’s a story for another time!).

Part of an 1830 map of Lincoln by John G. Hales. showing the town center — and the lack of road names. Source: Digital Commonwealth.

The town felt strongly that even these county roads mainly benefited other towns but not Lincoln. And so the town resisted. The Concord/Cambridge Turnpike (now Route 2) was a good example. The path of the turnpike was laid out in 1803, and it plowed through hills and wetlands in Lincoln, just so travelers between Cambridge and Concord would have the shortest and straightest route possible. Lincoln fought unsuccessfully against the turnpike, and later the town also resisted straightening the paths of two other roads through town—the Middle Road (now Trapelo Road) and the North Road (now Route 2A).

Lincoln had more success in preventing a major highway from running north and south through the heart of town. To this day, in contrast to neighboring towns, Lincoln does not have a numbered highway running through its town center.

For more on the history of Lincoln’s roads, see Tracing the History of Lincoln’s Ways, a 2019 manuscript by Kerry Glass, accessible by contacting the Lincoln Historical Society.

“Lincoln’s History” is an occasional column by members of the Lincoln Historical Society.

Capital spending requests on tap for Wednesday presentation

Capital spending requests that residents will vote at at Town Meeting on May 15 include funds for school furniture and equipment, a public safety radio system, and a new town well.

The Capital Planning Committee (CapCom) and the Community Preservation Committee (CPC) will host a joint Zoom presentation on their proposals on Wednesday, April 28 at 7:30 p.m. Click here for the agenda, which includes the Zoom link as well as brief descriptions of each item.

CapCom is proposing a total of $2,762,310 in two separate warrant articles that will be up for a vote on May 15. Article 7 seeks $937,695 for nine items. The single largest request is $410,557 for furniture and technology needs for the renovated Lincoln School that were cut earlier to stay within the construction budget. The only other six-figure item is $380,000 to refurbish the Fire Department’s ladder truck.

In a separate vote, CapCom will ask for $1,824,615 to replace the fire and police department’s public radio system. That item was originally considered for approval at the the 2020 Town Meeting but was deferred in favor of restoring some of the cuts to the school project.

The CPC is seeking approval to spend a total of $1,385,646 on 16 items costing $1,281,834 plus $103,812 from the housing reserve fund. Those items include $355,000 to repair the library’s parapet and $307,891 for debt service for the Town Office Building renovations as well as $161,200 for Lincoln School playground equipment and $200,000 for land acquisition.

Water Department funding

The Water Department is seeking capital spending totaling $907,600. That includes about $350,000 to complete a project to reduce total trihalomethanes (TTHM) in the drinking water, since they have been slightly over the state-mandated limit for some time. TTHMs are formed as the result of required chlorine disinfection on pond water with increasing levels of plant matter and algae.

Voters approved spending $330,000 in 2019 for the first phase of the project to install coagulation treatment to filter out more of the organic matter in the pre-treatment phase. The new expenditure will pay for equipment to handle the residuals from the treatment process so the chemicals can be safely released from the water plant without violating its discharge permit.

Water Commission chair Jim Hutchinson said the money needed for this second phase was not brought up last year as a future expense because the final cost was very uncertain at that time. Also, the commission’s Town Meeting presentation was limited to only items to be funded that year at the request of Town Moderator Sarah Cannon Holden in the interest of keeping the meeting short.

Also on the Water Commission’s wish list is $480,000 to replace the aging Tower Road well, which has been on their for several years. The group is hoping to pay for the well and the TTHM system by bonding $830,000. The other items on their capital improvements list will be paid for from Water Department retained earnings.

This is the third bonding request in two years for the Water Department. Voters approved almost $2 million (including the $330,000 for the first part of the TTHM project) in two separate measures in 2019, followed by $225,000 in borrowing voted at the 2020 Town Meeting.

“Much like the town as a whole, the Water Department has regular capital needs that are not properly handled in an operating budget, and need to be requested separately and funded with bonding or reserve funds. And that will continue to be the case going forward,” Hutchinson said. “It is true that the requests made in FY20-21 and that we are making for FY22 are larger than normal, due in part to the department previously falling behind on replacing aging infrastructure and in part due to the TTHM issue. Looking forward, we are striving to get back to a more ‘steady state’ level of requests for FY23, but there is always some amount of uncertainty and potential for surprises about capital needs.”

Water Department capital funding requests
CategoryDescriptionAmountFunding Source
Regulatory compliance with high TTHM levelsResiduals handling & neutralization system upgrades at water treatment plant (WTP) to comply with the EPA’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System discharge permit$350,000* Bonding
Aging infrastructureReplace Tower Road Well (current well cannot pump at desired rates despite aggressive cleanings due to clogged shutter-type screen)$480,000Bonding
Aging infrastructureReplace compressor #2 at WTP (two compressors in service since 1995; replace the one with more hours on it)$25,000Retained earnings
Increase resiliencyInvestigate cost and engineering needed to interconnect with Wayland. A backup water source is needed for our emergency response plan.$13,600Retained earnings
Increase resiliencyEvaluate current condition of storage tank and reconsider previously proposed solutions to what is currently our sole storage tank. $39,000Retained earnings
Required by Mass. Water Management Act permitConduct water audit to determine what happens to the water we produce. $31,500**Retained earnings
Total water capital projects:$939,100

* Subject to adjustment up until ATM motion is finalized, as T&H work to better define scope of this project.

* The Water Commission voted to remove this item from the warrant pending feedback from the state DEP on the town’s previous numbers.

This may be a bad year for Lyme disease

By Rhea Karty

(Editor’s note: Karty, a Lincoln resident, is a senior at Lincoln-Sudbury who has always been interested in biology, particularly diseases and ecology. “After taking biology and AP biology, I wanted to continue to broaden my understanding and look into some practical applications,” she said. “Lyme disease was really meaningful to me because many of my friends and coaches from cross-country and school have had scary experiences with it. So I worked with my former biology teacher (Ms. Shopiro) to develop an independent study curriculum where I studied the ecology, immune response, treatments, and microbiology of Lyme, and I interviewed some doctors and community members. Now I’m doing some projects to spread awareness.”

Acorns and mice and ticks — oh my!

With the onset of spring comes the bane of New England: Lyme disease. Amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, other diseases may have slipped off our radar, but Mother Nature is not so quick to give us a break. In fact, there may be a significant uptick in Lyme disease cases this year due to a bumper crop of acorns.

Oak trees operate in cycles: they naturally have years where they produce blankets of acorns and others where they have very few. As you may have noticed, 2019 was a particularly plentiful year for acorns in suburban New England, called a mast crop These blankets of acorns are great for wildlife and rodents, but also provide a building block for Lyme disease.

Lyme disease is caused by bacteria and is transmitted to humans through the bite of black-legged tick (Ixodes scapularis), sometimes known as deer ticks. The ticks pick it up from mice and other small rodents that are already infected with the bacteria.

Ticks feed three times in their life. In their larval stage just after they hatch from eggs, they bite and drink the blood of mice and small rodents. This is when they potentially become infected with Lyme disease. (Surprisingly, even though they are called deer ticks, they don’t actually get Lyme disease from deer.) Once a tick picks up Lyme disease, it will carry it for the rest of its life and is able to transmit it to humans.

In the next two years of a tick’s life, it will bite once or twice more. This is when humans can get the disease.

Our ecosystem operates in harmony, where changes in one section cascade to other areas. The plethora of acorns from the mast year provides plenty of food for the rodent population, which will then cause a higher population of infected ticks for the next one to two years, so, the acorn mast year in 2019 will be felt this year with increased ticks.

An illustration of how Lyme disease is transmitted between species (click to enlarge). Image courtesy Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

With indoor restrictions on gatherings still in place, we’re all hoping for an active outdoor spring. However, as kids go outside to play and families begin to start biking and walking in the woods, we should be aware that Lyme disease will be particularly bad this year and must keep an eye out for the symptoms. Here are a few things you can do to stay protected:

Dress — wear light-colored clothes, long pants, high socks, and bug spray, especially when venturing off trail.

Environment — Consider spraying for ticks or other remedies like tick tubes, essential oils, chickens, keeping deer out of your yard, maintaining a well-kept yard, and staying away from the edge of the woods.

Awareness — check for ticks after going outside. If a tick is pulled out within a short period of time, Lyme disease may be avoided. Make sure you have all the parts of the tick, including the eight legs and head.

If Lyme disease is caught and treated early, the worst effects can be prevented with antibiotics, so keep an eye out and be prepared. For more information about Lyme disease and symptoms, visit www.cdc.gov/lyme or www.mass.gov/service-details/lyme-disease.

“My Turn” is a forum for readers to offer their views on any subject of interest to other Lincolnites. Submissions must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Items will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Submissions containing personal attacks, errors of fact, or other inappropriate material will not be published.

Police log for April 17–23, 2021

April 17

Cranberry Hill Road, Lexington (7:01 p.m.) — Lexington Fire Department requested an engine respond to a fire alarm; call was canceled en route.

April 18

Old Concord Road (10:44 a.m.) — Acting on a complaint, a parking ticket was issued to vehicle parked in No Parking zone

Bake Bridge Road (3:00 p.m.) —Caller reported cars parked on the side of the road. Officer checked the area but the road was passable and there were no violations.

April 19

Juniper Ridge Road (6:46 p.m.) — Officer checked on a vehicle pulled over on the side of the road. Everything was fine, officer is clear

April 20

Weston Road (9:41 a.m.) — Cars parked on Weston Road close to the five-way intersection were moved along.

Tower Road (6:47 p.m.) — Resident reported that someone filed a fraudulent unemployment claim in their name.

Officer checked on a person walking along the roadway in dark clothing. The party’s vehicle was towed from Walden Pond, and officer assisted them with information as to which company towed the vehicle.

April 21

Trapelo Road (2:02 p.m.) — A group of juveniles fishing at the reservoir were asked to move along.

Trapelo Road (2:13 p.m.) — Officer checked on a vehicle parked at the Cambridge Reservoir reservoir pump house. The vehicle belonged to an employee.

April 22

Tower Road (8:27 a.m.) — Police received report that the railroad gates were stuck down. the MBTA was notified and reset the gates.

Doherty’s service station (11:54 a.m.) — Officer  stopped a vehicle that was reported as being stolen. After the vehicle pulled into Doherty’s and the officer spoke with the party, it was found that the vehicle’s license plate was stolen. The entering police agency was advised to correct the notification.

Mary’s Way (1:12 p.m.) — A caller wanted to speak to an officer regarding an issue with a resident allegedly harassing staff members and other residents. Officer spoke to the reporting party. All of the incidents happened in the past, and the caller was advised to contact police if and when the incidents happen so they can be addressed.

April 23

Codman Community Farms (12:41 p.m.) — Court paperwork was delivered.

Birchwood Lane (3:43 p.m.) — Court paperwork was delivered.

Drumlin Farm (8:29 p.m.) — A caller reported that several vehicles were parked in the field. Officer checked on the people, who were star-gazing.

Planning Board presentation to focus on bylaw proposals

Lincoln officials are gearing up for Annual Town Meeting with advance presentations via Zoom starting Tuesday night.

The Planning Board will explain and take questions about two measures — an accessory apartment zoning bylaw revision and a new illicit discharge/stormwater management general bylaw — on Tuesday, April 27 starting at 7 p.m. Click here for the Zoom link (meeting ID: 994 5136 7238; passcode: 317537).

The changes to the accessory apartment bylaw would add a cap on the number of accessory apartments allowed equal to 5% of all residential units in Lincoln. The board also proposes to remove limitations on the age of structures that are eligible to add accessory apartments, and to require a minimum rental term of 30 days where the accessory apartment or principal dwelling is occupied as a rental unit. 

Lincoln voters approved the Affordable Accessory Apartment program four years ago, but it was only recently that the state officially OK’d it, so the local rules needed some tweaks before the program can finally launch.

Stormwater proposal

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has identified land disturbance and polluted storm water runoff as a major source of water pollution. Under Lincoln’s federal and state environmental permits, it’s required to work on a range of measures including adoption of a Stormwater Management Bylaw.

This bylaw would prohibit pollutants and other non-stormwater discharge such as an indoor drains, sinks, toilets, or washing machines from being discharged into the storm drain system or a water course. The Planning Board would administer the town’s Stormwater Management program and adopt regulations including rules to ensure erosion control during construction.

More information:

Future presentations will be announced to give residents as much advance information as possible with the goal of keeping the outdoor May 15 ATM as short as possible.

Obituaries

Bojan Rip, 43

Rip was a native of Sarajevo, Bosnia and worked as an engineer at Bose. He died on April 20. Full obituary.

Manson Solomon, 79

Solomon, who died on March 26, was best known to Lincolnites as a founder of the Lincoln Traditional Jazz Band. Full obituary.

Carol Wagner, 84

Wagner, formerly of New Jersey and Florida, was a nurse, teacher, and family counselor. She passed away on February 15. Full obituary.

Bojan Rip

Manson Solomon