By Carol Britton Meyer

The select board this week heard a much-anticipated update on the water discoloration issue that had plagued many Hull, Hingham, and some Cohasset residents since June 19. As of Wednesday, most had been resolved.

Both Weir River Water System Managing Director/Superintendent Russell Tierney and Veolia Regional Vice President John Oatley spoke to the board Wednesday night and at a three-hour WRWS water meeting Wednesday afternoon. (See related story, page 1.) Veolia operates the water system. Both meetings were recorded.

“Customer service received 700 calls in three hours,” Tierney noted.

The discolored water was about a 50-hour event, according to Oatley.

“We’ll do everything we can to prevent this from happening again. We are studying where the gaps occurred,” he said. “This happens in a lot of [communities], especially with older water systems.”

The WRWS water is tested regularly, with Veolia working with the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection to ensure compliance with DEP standards. Updates will be available. A flushing program is key to water quality, according to Tierney.

In response to a question from board member Greg Grey, Tierney confirmed that if the planned new Strawberry Hill water tank had been in place, the current situation could have likely been avoided or mitigated.

The preliminary design for the one-million gallon storage tank – double the size of the tank that was dismantled in 2009 – is in the works, Tierney said. The booster station will be located in Hingham. The timeframe for project completion is about three years.

“It’s impossible to convey how irate and furious people are at the moment,” board member Jerry Taverna said. “People are calling state senators demanding refunds. From residents’ perspective, their water bills are [already] high.”

Tierney confirmed that water officials are talking about a possible credit on water bills, with more information to come.

“We all worked as a team to manage the situation as best we could on behalf of residents,” Town Manager Jennifer Constable said.

Resident Polly Rowe thanked all those involved “for the tremendous work that was done in navigating this crisis.”

To receive WRWS/Veolia updates and alerts, visit www.weirriverwater.com to subscribe. Since renters aren’t part of the billing system, efforts will be made to find a way to keep them informed.

For customer service, email operations@weirriverwater.com.

In other business at the meeting…

• Courtney Littlefield was appointed to serve on the school committee until the May 2025 town election, filling the seat formerly occupied by Ernest Minelli, who resigned earlier this year.

The school committee and select board met in joint session Wednesday to interview Littlefield and two other candidates for the opening -- Jeffrey Cameron and Laurie McDowell.

Littlefield, a longtime Hull resident and Hull High School graduate, has two daughters in the Hull Public Schools and has been involved with youth sports for a number of years.

As her daughters start aging out of youth sports programs, she felt the time was right to explore the opportunity to serve on the school committee.

Littlefield was also involved in the search for a new Hull High principal. “Having Robert Shaw [the new principal] onboard will be a huge asset,” she said.

Littlefield named moving eighth-graders to the high school as part of the HPS reconfiguration plan as a major challenge.

“I think this needs to be a team effort. Parent involvement is huge with the younger kids,” she said.

She also considers Hull’s low enrollment to be a key issue.

School Committee Chair David Twombly pointed out that the two candidates who were not appointed will have an opportunity to run for a seat on the committee in next year’s election.

• There also was a discussion about the establishment of a dog park exploratory committee in response to a suggestion made at this year’s town meeting when voters turned down a warrant article that would have appropriated $10,000 in Community Preservation funds for that purpose.

After some discussion among board members about the pros and cons of creating such a committee, David Irwin stood up in the audience and announced that he had already started an ad hoc committee consisting of eight residents planning to meet after the July 4 holiday.

The board gave Irwin its blessing to move forward in that capacity and to report back at a later date after identifying potential sites and talking with neighbors.

Irwin offered an amusing disclaimer: “I have never owned a dog, just cats! I’ll have to buy a dog!” he quipped.

Constable asked Irwin and the group to come back before the board with suggested sites in time to reapply for CPA funds for fencing, design, and development if the idea moves forward.

• Constable reported the Public Health Nurse Rachel Gerold was appointed to the position of public health director. “She’s been doing a stand-up job as acting health director for the past couple of months,” she said.

• The Request for Information for recreational marijuana applications was posted on the town website on Wednesday.

• June 19’s traffic volume may go down in the town’s history, Constable said, noting that she has spoken with the state and local police and the Hull Redevelopment Authority regarding the parking lot on that property and bottlenecks as cars tried to enter the lots.

“This was just beyond a perfect storm of events due to the federal Juneteenth holiday falling on the first day of a heat wave,” which attracted many cars from various locations to Nantasket Beach in part due to the closure of a number of other beaches in the area, Constable explained. “The traffic was handled well, but it was the heaviest and of longest duration that Hull has seen for some time.” Signs notifying beachgoers of the full parking lots were posted that day.

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