Late summer/early fall car wash fundraiser dates are now open. Please sign up for your date of choice using the link on our website.… Read on
What is Medfield’s Car Wash Fundraiser Policy?
Applicants must be local Town of Medfield non profit organizations. There is only one car wash per Saturday, choice of 9AM to 1PM or 10AM to 2PM. Please use this link to sign up for late summer/early fall 2023 dates. If you would like assistance signing up, please contact Brittney Franklin at bfranklin@medfield.net.
Applicant is responsible for picking up water key the Friday before the Fundraiser, water key must be returned in the Green Box on Janes Avenue at the conclusion of the fundraiser. An Adult must be present at all car wash fundraisers.All car wash fundraisers will be postponed if the Board of Selectmen has declared a partial or total Water Ban.
I hold regular monthly office hours at The Center on the first Friday of every month from 9:00 to 10:00 AM. Residents are welcome to stop by to talk in person about any town matters. Residents can also have coffee and see the Council on Aging in action (a vibrant organization with lots going on). I can be reached via 508-359-9190 or this blog about Medfield matters https://medfield02052.wordpress.com, where any schedule changes will be posted.
This first survey will inform the SBC of your perspective on the prior proposal and what is currently important to you as the new process begins. Please visit…… Read on
Hate crimes increased by 30% in 2022, ADL report finds
May 23, 2023
Alison Kuznitz, State House News Service
A masked group display a banner with the words “Keep Boston Irish,” along the route of the St. Patrick’s Day parade on March 20, 2022. (Steven Senne/AP)
Hate crimes reported in Massachusetts rose more than 30% between 2021 and 2022, according to a new report from the Anti-Defamation League. The report indicates the rise in hate and extremism has been driven by antisemitic attacks, white supremacist propaganda and anti-LGBTQ+ threats and harassment.
Trailing only Texas, Massachusetts recorded the second highest number of white supremacist propaganda incidents last year, the report found. The distribution of white supremacist propaganda increased by 71% from 2021 and 2022 — rising from 272 instances to 465 — largely attributed to groups like Patriot Front, the Nationalist Social Club and the Goyim Defense League, according to the report.
You should immediately contact your local police department if you feel you are the victim of a hate crime. Victims of hate crimes can file a civil rights complaint with the Attorney General’s Office or call the office’s special hotline at 1-800-994-3228.”
For Massachusetts state government annual reports:
Photo by Colleen Sullivan at the recent Hunter’s Run (I have no photos of my marathons)
My Marathons
This week I researched about my two Boston marathon runs, and learned that in 1986 and 1987 only about 6,000 people ran, so my jumping in at the end of the pack even without a bib was accepted. My first discovery was that on race day one cannot get dropped off at the start. It was a couple of mile walk from where the streets were closed to get to the start. Downtown Hopkinton so many people doing things with bandaids and creams, while I had none and no idea I needed them – so I worried that I just was not ready. I walked to the very end of the crowd, and assumed a place to await the starting gun. When we heard the gun we all started to jog, but since no one ahead of us had moved, we had no where to go. It took ten minutes to get to the starting line. I figured I had just given the elite runners a two mile head start, but I was just thrilled to participate in the same event as them.
The sides of the course at the start were memorable for being littered with discarded sweatshirts and clothing. Again, I had none to toss – more concerns.
The course starts downhill from Hopkinton, but although we were now jogging, there were so many runners so crowded together, that you could not pass anyone – it took two miles before the crowds thinned enough to where you could start to run your own speed. Give the elite runners another mile advantage.
1986 was cold and rainy, good for running. I was coming from my first marathon and my first road race ever in Conway, NH the prior year where I was so slow I did not see another runner or spectator for the second half the race. The crowds all along the way in Boston were welcoming. After the race I recall being so cold I tried to keep warm wrapped in my plastic reflective blanket under a ceiling light in the Harvard Bookstore Café on Newbury Street where I was meeting Deb to get a ride home. The next day I did as I was taught, walking down stairs backwards since it did not hurt as much.
1987 was one of the hottest races ever, 87 degrees with 96% humidity, I learned this week. I was too naïve a runner to know it was even an issue, but I got an instant education when I looked over my left shoulder into the huge Army tent at the bottom of Heartbreak Hill and glimpsed through the open flaps the expanse of cots full of runners connected to IV’s. The IV’s really scared me, but I did not know what to do with the information. Fortunately, I had logged a lot miles in my over winter training, so I had a strong run.
That winter there was a snow on the ground most of the time. So most of my road work, done after work by myself in the dark, took place in the Newton Cemetery where I could run safely with my Golden, Charlotte, instead of on the snow banked city streets. That winter I became convinced that the mausoleums actually had lights because of the reflections I saw off the marble. I do have one vivid memory that winter of my friend Scott Bock, who ran Riverside Community Care where I was on the board and with whom I also ran at times, yelling at me from his passing car about being risking injury for running through foot deep snow.
At the time I lived in Newtonville near mile 19, and my niece, Christine Louis, from my first marriage, who was living at my house, jumped in to run with me at Newton City Hall, and ran with me to the end. That was a real mental lift to have a companion for the hardest part. It also kept me from just stopping and walking home. At the finish, despite not having a bib, I was handed the reflective plastic warming blanket runners got, because of the mess I must have looked, but the dispensing volunteer started to hand one to Christine only to pull it back because in an instant he recognized that she had run only 7 miles instead of the 26.2 that earned a plastic sheet.
1987 was my best time, 3:45, but I was disappointed as I thought I should have been faster, based on my training. I could run 8 minute miles forever, and was also pretty easily doing 7 minute miles when pressing. My three marathon career times were 5:54, 4:45, and 3:45, so I bragged that given my rate of progression if I ran two more times I should win. But I never even achieved my own personal goal to not still be in Wellesley when the race was won.
When I stopped running enough to run marathons, I missed it deeply every year when the Boston Marathon came around again. Less so as the years of running less accumulated, but this year as I isolated with COVID and watched the Boston Marathon I recognized that the desire to run another marathon is still strong in me. Time to start logging my miles – day 1 today, 2.5 miles.
The House and Senate both passed a compromise supplemental 2023 budget bill today that includes a majority of the governor’s proposed “immediate needs” bond bill as well as extensions of pandemic-related authorizations related to public meetings and outdoor dining.
The bill was originally filed by Gov. Maura Healey in January, and both chambers had passed slightly different versions earlier this month.
The final bill (H. 47) includes extensions to pandemic-related authorizations that were set to expire next week
I started this blog to share the interesting and useful information that I saw while doing my job as a Medfield select board member. I thought that my fellow Medfield residents would also find that information interesting and useful as well. This blog is my effort to assist in creating a system to push the information out from the Town House to residents. Let me know if you have any thoughts on how it can be done better.
For information on my other job as an attorney (personal injury, civil litigation, estate planning and administration, and real estate), please feel free to contact me at 617-969-1500 or Osler.Peterson@OslerPeterson.com.
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