In the January 18 Lincoln Squirrel article about the Winter Carnival, the time for the start of PTO Bingo Night has been moved to 5:45 p.m. The original post has been updated to reflect this correction.
Harold McAleer took this photo of the waxing moon over Lincoln. The dot near the center is the Copernicus crater, while the large dark circle above it is Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains). Ranging to the right of that are Mare Serenitatus (Sea of Serenity), Mare Tranquillitatus (Sea of Tranquility, where the Apollo 11 astronauts landed, though Harold’a camera is not up to the task of revealing the lunar module), Mare Foecunditatus (Sea of Fertility), and (above right) Mare Crisium (Sea of Crises). Source: Wikimedia Commons
Drumlin Farm’s resident groundhog, Ms. G.
Mass Audubon’s Drumlin Farm Wildlife Sanctuary is set to host its annual Groundhog Day event on Tuesday, Feb. 2. Watch Ms. G, the official state groundhog of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as she wakes from her winter hibernation and decides whether or not spring will come early this year.
Drumlin Farm will be open on February 2 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. This special event is free with paid admission ($8 adults and teens; $6 children 2-12 and seniors), and free for Mass Audubon members. The live groundhog forecast starts at 10 a.m., followed by winter activities such as meeting Drumlin’s resident wildlife, exploring wilderness trails, and learning how to identify animal tracks in the snow. Hot cocoa will be provided.
Featured activities:
Former WBZ-TV weather personality Mish Michaels will be on hand to share the story of the Wellesley school students who joined Mass Audubon in submitting the bill to the Massachusetts state legislature to declare Ms. G the official state groundhog. The bill was successfully enacted into law and signed by Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick on July 31, 2014.
Planning Board
Conservation Commission
Public hearing on Wednesday, Feb. 3 at 7:45 p.m in response to a Request for Determination of Applicability by George Seeley for a replacement septic system within the 100-foot buffer zone at 212 Concord Road.
Mary Alice Boyce
Mary Alice Boyce, 93 (January 17) — worked in Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson administrations; St. Joseph’s communicant
James Jhun (January 17) — 2012 alumnus of Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School
Residents are invited to learn about gun safety and a pending Lincoln Town Meeting resolution advocating a national gun safety law on Saturday, Jan. 23 starting with a reception at 9:30 a.m. in Bemis Hall.
Lincoln Police Chief Kevin Kennedy and Sgt. Paul Westlund will speak at 10 a.m. about gun law differences in neighboring states and how they impact Massachusetts residents. They will also discuss safe practices for handling guns in homes, particularly where children are present.
At 11 a.m., there will be a discussion of a draft Town Meeting resolution on “A Petition to the U.S. Congress to Adopt a Uniform National Gun Safety Law Applying Equally to All States.”
Light refreshments will be provided. The event is sponsored by the Lincoln Democratic Town Committee. For more information, email garyddavis04@gmail.com.
The newly installed solar array in Far Meadow.
A “solar farm” is nearing completion at Far Meadow on property owned by Lincoln Woods, and if the good weather holds, it should be producing non-polluting electricity by the end of February.
Four hundred solar panels have been installed and the electrical connections are currently being made. You can see the installation by walking out the dirt road parallel to the railroad tracks from the commuter parking lot. Once it’s on line, the project is expected produce 112 kW of electricity. The average Massachusetts home used about 615 kWh of electricity per month in 2014, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Additional collectors are being installed on the flat-roofed Lincoln Woods units themselves. Their completion will depend on other work being done to bring Lincoln Woods in compliance with state refunding requirements.
The Far Meadow site is a relatively small installation and is expected to have minimal impact on the conservation land and meadow habitat which it abuts, according to Conservation Commission co-chair Peter von Mertens.
The town is looking into the idea of creating a larger solar site atop the old landfill tat could produce somewhere from 650 kW to 980 kW of electricity. Lincoln’s Green Energy Technology Committee presented information on this at the State of the Town meeting in November 2015.
Editor’s note: this letter is in response to a letter published on January 12.
To the editor:
Michael Coppock’s questions and complaints about the Leaf Blower Study Group’s activities answer themselves, by and large. He notes the cost of the flyers mentioned in his letter (January 12, 2016) came from the Selectmen’s printing budget. Simply put, this expenditure, authorized by elected officials and/or persons appointed by them, reflected the interest of the town’s governing bodies in a subject that addresses both quality of life and health issues affecting Lincoln residents. The extent to which leaf-blower emissions and noise are seen as a public health problem is reflected by the existence of hundreds of local laws, ordinances and regulations regarding use of these machines in counties, cities, towns, and villages across the land and around the world. To be sure, these measures have proved difficult to enforce, for a number of reasons—but that does not diminish the public’s interest or the nature of the problem or the Board of Health’s responsibility to address it.
[Read more…] about Letter to the editor: rebuttals on leaf blower issue
Lincoln’s Winter Carnival from January 28-31, 2016 features two original performances, snowshoe outings, skating, a celebration of Lincoln authors, and the traditional coffee house and snow sculpture contest. [Read more…] about Get ready for Winter Carnival
The Lincoln Squirrel story about Mary’s Way incorrectly described where the new road is located. It runs along the south side of Route 2 from Crosby’s Corner to Deerhaven Road, not Brooks Road to Rockwood Lane. The accompanying map also reversed the labels for Horses Crossing and Emerson Road. The article and map have been updated to reflect these corrections.