Forestdale man pleads guilty to voter fraud

By Ethan Genter

Posted Nov 27, 2019

Police say he cast ballots in Sandwich and Dennis in 2016 presidential election.

ORLEANS — A Forestdale man has pleaded guilty in Orleans District Court to charges that he voted in two towns in the 2016 presidential election.

Mark Goode, 64, pleaded guilty Nov. 18 to charges of attempting to vote twice and false registration as a voter. Investigators say he was registered to vote in Sandwich and Dennis and voted in both towns in the last presidential election.

Sandwich police found that Goode had registered under different dates of birth, one of which was false and allowed him to avoid detection by election officials.

Goode registered for early voting in Sandwich and voted in person in Dennis for the same election, police said.

In June, Goode told Dennis police that he used to live in Dennis but had been living in Sandwich for the past six years. Goode said he went to the polls in Dennis and was told that he already had voted, according to the Dennis police report. He said he then left and went to vote in Sandwich.

Goode told police he knew people could not vote twice but did not know you could not register in two towns. He said he believed someone had used his name and voted in his place in Dennis.

The Dennis police report did not indicate how Goode voted in either town.

Goode originally pleaded not guilty when he was arraigned on the charges in August. He paid a $200 fine for each charge after changing his plea, according to court documents.

Sandwich backs $20M for active living center, library work Voters also bar town purchase of single-use plastic bottles.

Sandwich backs $20M for active living center, library work

By Geoff Spillane
Posted Oct 29, 2019

Voters also bar town purchase of single-use plastic bottles.

SANDWICH — Special town meeting on Monday approved spending $20 million for construction of a new Center for Active Living on Quaker Meetinghouse Road and renovations to the public library on Main Street.

The projects, included in the same article, will not affect the town’s tax rate and will be paid for through two new revenue sources: a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement for Canal Generating LLC’s Unit 3 and the new short-term rental tax.

The Center for Active Living will include a large multipurpose space that can be partitioned for smaller uses. It also will feature game rooms, a kitchen facility and a community gym that will be outfitted with pickleball courts and an elevated walking track, among other features. The project will cost about $16.5 million, and the library renovations about $3.5 million.

Sandwich also became the seventh Cape Cod town to prohibit municipal purchase of single-use water (or other beverage) plastic bottles and the sale of the bottles on town property. The petition article passed by unanimous vote.

A full house of more than 900 voters attended the meeting, dispatching of the 11-article warrant in about 3½ hours.

Voters also approved disposition by sale of the Forestdale Fire Station building on Route 130 and the expenditure of $340,000 for a new ambulance and related equipment.

They also approved spending Community Preservation Act funds on two projects: $51,000 to support Latham Centers Inc. in construction of housing for four disabled adults to age in place and $47,438 for the construction and maintenance of a disc golf course at the town’s Oak Crest Cove property on Quaker Meetinghouse Road.

The meeting started more than a half-hour late to accommodate voters waiting to check in.

Sandwich pay-as-you-throw effort deemed success, while Middleboro lags

Are Middleboro residents asking 'Where is Middleboro?' 

Did anyone notice that Middleboro raised the FEE PER BAG to residents who recycle so heavily, they don't pay for quarterly trash pick-up? 

How short-sighted!

Why is the Middleboro DPW continuing to pick up over-stuffed trash barrels?

Will Middleboro ever get dragged into the 21st Century?   

Sandwich pay-as-you-throw effort deemed success

Program said to save town money, increase recycling, reduce waste

Program has saved town money, increased recycling, reduced waste, DPW says.

|

A Sandwich resident throws a pay-as-you-go garbage bag into the trash heap at the Sandwich transfer station. The town's Department of Public Works reports that the program, implemented four years ago, has save the town $600,000 and doubled the amount of material being recycled. Steve Heaslip/Cape Cod Times file

By George Brennan
gbrennan@capecodonline.com

Posted Aug. 18, 2015

SANDWICH — The pay-as-you-throw program has saved the town nearly $600,000 over four years and has doubled the amount that residents are recycling, according to a Department of Public Works assessment.

Four years ago, the Board of Selectmen took a bold vote authorizing the department to enact the program, which requires residents with a transfer station sticker to purchase special bags for their trash — in essence paying only for what they throw away.

The results have been impressive. Along with the overall savings and the increase in recycling, the town has lowered the amount of its waste from 5,329 tons the first year of the program in 2011 to 2,710 tons in the fiscal year that just ended. That decrease comes as tipping fees to bring that rubbish to the waste-to-energy plant in Rochester have increased from $37.51 per ton to $65 per ton.

“It's no surprise to us at this point,” public works director Paul Tilton said. Residents have taken it upon themselves to save money through recycling, which benefits the town as a whole, he said. "Recycling is a great way to control costs and it's something they can control."

Joshua Kolling-Perrin, a spokesman for WasteZero, the national company that worked with Sandwich on the program, said the town has performed better than most of the 800 cities and towns the company has worked with nationwide. The national average for reducing waste is 44 percent, and Sandwich has dropped 49 percent, he said.

“How can you not be happy with the success of the program?” Frank Pannorfi, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, said.

Pannorfi was on the committee that studied the program but wasn’t a selectman at the time it was approved. “We didn’t take it to town meeting and ask that it be done,” he said. “The board had great courage in saying this is our decision. This is why the voters elected us.”

The savings through the trash program, as well as some health care savings for town workers and a solar farm that has cut the town’s electric bill, have allowed the town to hire four additional firefighters, another police detective and civilian dispatchers, Pannorfi said.

“If we did not have that differential, we would not be able to do these things,” he said.

The town’s fourth year of gains comes as other communities, including Dennis, Mashpee and Barnstable, are considering the program.

“I’m surprised, frankly, other communities haven’t done what we’ve done,” Pannorfi said.

Initially, the town lost about 500 customers to private haulers, but some of those people have come back, Tilton said.

There was a short period of backlash, especially in the first month of the program when bags were ripping, Pannorfi said. Once that was fixed by the town’s contractor, WasteZero, the critics were quieted and the success speaks for itself, he said.

For the first time since the program was put in place, the town increased the price of a transfer station sticker by $5 — to $60 per year — to help offset an increase in tipping fees, Tilton said. The fees for the bags have remained the same, he said.


http://www.capecodtimes.com/article/20150818/NEWS/150819424/101015/NEWSLETTER100

Sandwich keeps saving with pay-as-you-throw

Sandwich keeps saving with pay-as-you-throw

 

By George Brennan

gbrennan@capecodonline.com

August 18, 2014

SANDWICH – The town Department of Public Works continues to pile up the savings three years into its pay-as-you-throw program for residential trash.

 

According to figures released by Waste Zero, the town’s consultant on the program, and the department, the town has reduced its solid waste by 48 percent, doubled its recycling rate and saved $426,000 in the three years.

 

“I guess three years is proof that it’s working,” Public Works Director Paul Tilton said.

 

Reducing solid waste and increasing recycling are important because the town’s fees to take trash to Covanta SEMASS, the waste-to-energy plant in Rochester, are about to go up. The town has signed a new contract to pay $65 per ton, instead of $37 per ton, when the contract expires at the end of 2014.

 

The pay-as-you-throw program has exceeded the town’s expectations, Tilton said.

 

“While reluctant to accept PAYT at first, the public has embraced the program and continues to realize the benefits to the town of Sandwich and themselves,” he said. “The residents are making fewer trips to the transfer station, reducing their trash, and increasing their recycling. This effort by the public will go a long way to help offset future tipping fee increases starting in 2015. This will, in turn, help keep sticker and bag fees at a minimum.”

 

Two other Cape towns – Brewster and Wellfleet – have followed Sandwich’s lead.

 

 

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20140818/NEWS/140819393/-1/NEWSLETTER100

 

 

Don't you wish......

this would happen more frequently to reduce the drunks on our roads? 

15-day liquor license loss for China Palace

By George Brennan

gbrennan@capecodonline.com

September 27, 2013

 

SANDWICH — China Palace will have its liquor license suspended for 15 days after the Board of Selectmen found that the restaurant allowed a woman to get drunk, get behind the wheel and injure a state trooper responding to one of two crashes she had that night.

 

"There's a systemic problem in your (restaurant) that you've failed to correct," Selectman Frank Pannorfi said before the Board of Selectmen voted unanimously to suspend the restaurant's license.

 

Along with the violation, the board voted unanimously that the restaurant hindered the investigation of Sandwich police Sgt. Joseph Cotter by not turning over the woman's receipt as evidence.

 

China Palace has five days to appeal the suspension, scheduled to begin Oct. 21, to the state's Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission.

 

Selectmen heard testimony that Danyelle Goulette, 23, got drunk at China Palace Restaurant

Aug. 1 after being served a mai tai and a vodka tonic within 30 minutes. After leaving the restaurant, she crashed twice in the early morning of Aug. 2 on Route 3 in Plymouth, at one point striking a state trooper who responded to the first crash.

 

This is not the first time that the restaurant has been disciplined by the board. Last August, China Palace was served a two-day suspension after being found in violation of its liquor license by serving an already intoxicated patron. Three years earlier, the restaurant was disciplined for three separate incidents, though those were bundled together by the board as one violation.

 

Under the board's guidelines, that would have meant a five-day suspension, but Police Chief Peter Wack urged the board to take all of those violations — six in total — into consideration. He recommended the 15-day penalty.

 

China Palace owner Joseph Chow Wai Leung was defiant during his testimony, saying he didn't recall the woman at the restaurant. Asked if he took responsibility for serving Goulette, he said, "No."

Leung said he would not serve someone showing signs she was drunk. "I would not let any person have two drinks in half an hour," he said.

 

Goulette did not testify at the hearing, but Sgt. Joseph Baker, one of the state police troopers who investigated her crash, said Goulette blew a .16 on the Breathalyzer four hours after the crash. She was taken to the hospital in between, he said.

 

Earlier in the day, selectmen were more lenient with two stores found guilty of their first violations.

Meetinghouse Package Store and Sandwich Food Mart were given warnings for selling alcohol to minors.

 

In the case of Meetinghouse, owner Dennis Konary told the board he has purchased a $3,500 system to detect fake IDs. "We've tried to take steps to prevent this from ever happening again," Konary said.

 

Though the 20-year-old did not show a fake ID that night, he had been in the store with an ID to purchase alcohol in the past, including on occasion with his father, Konary said.

 

Zahid Rashid, owner of Sandwich Food Mart, said he would consider purchasing a similar system for fake IDs, though he acknowledged his clerk never asked the patron for one. "I am sorry to be here," Rashid said, noting that he fired the clerk involved and has retrained staff. "I have zero tolerance for this."

 

Rashid and Konary got a stern warning from board members. "This is no joke. We're the licensing authority. We issue licenses. We take them away. It's that simple," Selectman John Kennan said.

 

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20130927/NEWS/309270327/-1/NEWSLETTER100

 

 

One to Watch - Canal plant owner to merge

Canal plant owner to merge

 

By ROBERT GOLD

rgold@capecodonline.com

July 28, 2012

SANDWICH — GenOn Energy, which owns the power plant on the Cape Cod Canal, recently announced plans to merge with a New Jersey energy company.

GenOn and and NRG Energy signed a "definitive agreement" to merge, they announced, with the name remaining NRE Energy.

GenOn formed in 2010 when Houston-based RRI Energy and Mirant Corp. merged. It remains based in Texas.

Its Massachusetts properties include the canal plant, which has a capacity of 1,126 megawatts; back-up diesel generating facilities in West Tisbury and Oak Bluffs; and Kendall Cogeneration Station in Cambridge, which has a 256-megawatt capacity.

Selectman Frank Pannorfi said the board was briefed on the merger by a GenOn official Thursday night.

"My initial reaction was, 'Gee you have big-time organization, major players nationally in the energy generation business and unless you're buying for tax write-off purposes, you may be thinking about a green energy development — gas or hydroelectric, who knows?" Pannorfi said. "I can't wait until (the merger) develops a little more."

The merger is expected to close within the first three months of next year, according to the companies.

It will have to be approved by several groups, including the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and shareholders of both companies.

GenOn spokesman Chip Little said the Sandwich facility will continue as a power plant. An NRG spokesperson did not return a call seeking comment.

The canal plant, under an agreement with the town, agreed in 2005 to pay $2.4 million annually in taxes until 2013.

Doug Lapp, assistant town manager for Sandwich, said he doesn't foresee any problems getting a new contract signed between the plant and the town.

"That is not an issue," he said.

NRE Energy will keep both existing headquarters — in Princeton, N.J., and Houston, Texas, according to the companies.

Staff writer George Brennan contributed to this report.

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120728/BIZ/207280312/-1/NEWSLETTER100