Most stories/persons fictional.
Phyllis Hull not fictional (her actions described here, however, are).
Names of other board members/selectmen/etc. fictional.
Remarks regarding earthquakes fictional.
Wakefield Daily Item
Friday, July 10th, 2009
Hull to lunge at Lehrer and Pittman for "abuse of position"
-WAKEFIELD
-Phyllis Hull announced Thursday that she wants to lunge at County Board representatives from Wakefield Pete Lehrer and Ivan Pittman for "abuse of position," claiming "nongovernmental conduct" towards Hull's speeches and ideals. She plans to also recommend to County Clerk Sean Shawset their dismissal from the county board. Said one concerned citizen, Pierce Warner, "where does she [Hull] come here with the guts or the nerve to do this? She's not even on the county board! She just announced that she was running for the county board two days ago! She's not even on it yet; and she's not even on the Board of Selectmen anymore, so she's not even part of any governmental officiating body where she has any right to take any action against this!"
Hull said, in response to Warner's comment, "I still am a strong presence around Middlesex County, and, even though I am not part of a governmental body, I do have the absolute sole right to recommend to the County Clerk their dismissal, as no 'talk-backers' like Lehrer and Pittman should be on the board. Those two really need to get with the program. Holding a governmental position means being courteous with it, not abusing it by using it to make themselves look more influential when they unleash trash talk towards me. Those two are just making themselves idiotic."
However, the consensus seems to be that if anybody is looking idiotic due to self-induced causes, it's Hull. Said Ivan Pittman, "This really is an enraging comment to hear from Hull, and an infuriating decision on her part. What really irks me is what the other citizen that was interviewed, Pierce Warner, said, was true. If Hull was on the county board or still a Selectwoman, fine. But she is not, and so she doesn't have any governmental right to take such action. While it is against codes of conduct for county board members to show vulgarity towards fellow members, this would not apply because Hull is NOT ON the county board yet, and, if she does become a part of it, I will rescind my comments because I know that they are in violation of the rules should that come to pass, and I am always for abiding by the rules of my office."
Hull plans to "emphasize the idiocy" of Lehrer and Pittman at a newly-scheduled August 2 rally in the Hull-supporting town of Tewksbury.
MGLD receives outcry from town over online payment rescindment
-WAKEFIELD
-The town wanted the MGLD to break their last ties to the Board of Selectmen, but not if that meant rescinding their immensely popular online payment system. MGLD customers have now created a gigantic outcry over the fact that they have rescinded their online payment program due to budget cuts and strapped funding. Said an MGLD spokesperson, who chose not to reveal his name for job safety reasons (several MGLD board members have received dismissal threats from citizens for what some citizens consider "a crime against Wakefield"), "The online payment program was an invention of the Board of Selectmen, and it choked us of all of our funding. Now that we're independent, we had to immediately rescind the program. We had no other choice. We would have gone belly-up had we kept it running."
The frustration over the rescindment has gotten so intense that a group of Wakefieldians bought the web page formerly used for MGLD online payment and renamed the web domain to turn it into a website warning Wakefieldians of "the coming age without online payment." On its home page it states, "Wakefield was fine all these years without online payment, but only with Selectmen moderation. Now with the independence of the MGLD, online payment is needed more than ever to keep the company alive and running. If you care about your water and power, you will go out and protest aganst this rescindment, and hope that the next time you visit this page this message will be gone and the online payment program will be back in its place!"
A long line formed again Thursday at the MGLD offices, the line that had been nonexistent with the online payment program.
More youths causing mischief in town due to summer boredom ; foreigners found with invalid certification ; first earthquake since Jan. 2006 hits Wakefield area
-WAKEFIELD
-In anticipation of more increases in youth mischief due to the big white elephant of the summer break: boredom, Deputy Will Halveles issued another bulletin at 4:16 p.m. yesterday urging parents to keep track of their children's whereabouts. "These kids get bored and then start fighting each other for no good reason; we see this every summer, but a lot especially this summer, so, just something to keep in mind when your kids are out unsupervised," said Halveles. To a group of concerned parents, Halveles assured them that "a rise in youth mischief is a part of summer here in Wakefield and should not be worried about if parents have a firm hold on their kids." Six out of sixteen calls yesterday into this morning involved youths.
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The INS is to be notified of a man from Nicaragua whose U.S. certification was found invalid and/or expired when an officer red-flagged a vehicle of unknown make or model for crossing marked lanes at 10:17 p.m. Thursday. The driver had a U.S. license, which was invalid, and a Nicaraguan license which was expired. The driver was taken into temporary custody. A passenger in the car had a legal U.S. license and valid U.S. certification. The driver was visiting Massachusetts from Nicaragua, while the passenger had lived legally in Massachusetts since 2007, it was found out. Police granted the passenger temporary posession of the vehicle while the driver was taken for investigation. After a search of the car, police confiscated eight empty Dunkin' Donuts boxes, a cell phone with 75 unread text messages dating to March 30, 2009, a PDA with 4 unread "notices" dating to June 6, 2009, and a leather strap that looked like a dog leash. While the driver was questioned, the phone received eight new text messages from a (413) area code (Western Massachusetts/Pittsfield.) After questioning, the driver was released, although the driver's license was confiscated and it was made clear that the passenger must be the driver of the vehicle. At 10:46 p.m., after a thorough investigation, the vehicle left the scene.
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More youths were found in the middle of an altercation on Outlook Road, 11:29 a.m. Thursday. One of six youths involved obtained a minor injury to the arm; a call to that youth's home phone number shortly after revealed he had returned home. The other five involved fled the scene within about ninety seconds of the arrival of police. One of the five who fled was briefly questioned, giving his name but no other personal details.
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A second altercation occurred Thursday on the Upper Common, 5:11 p.m. Four youths were questioned; two fled the scene almost immediately. One youth, said a witness, had been raveled into the altercation unknowingly and by accident. That youth gave his name and phone number. By 6:21 p.m., police called that number and it was revealed the youth was home. The other of the two remaining youths gave his address and phone number but not his name. A call to that number shortly after revealed the youth still had not returned home. Calls repeated at half-hour intervals until, at 7:48 p.m., a call confirmed the youth had finally returned home.
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A party of teenagers who had trespassed into a yard to congregate was dispersed at 8:50 a.m. The homeowner requested the street on which the trespassing occurred not be published. Of four teenagers, one gave full information; by 8:53 a.m., all had left the scene.
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A party of eight teenagers was found playing pocket pool in a garage at 3:56 a.m. on Tamworth Hill Avenue. All gave phone numbers, except for one, who lived in the house adjoining the garage; subsequent calls to each number revealed all had returned home, by, at the latest, 4:27 a.m.
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A youth, or possibly a late night door-to-door salesman, was suspected for theft of a DVD player on Lowell Street at 10:32 p.m.; when police arrived, no youths or salesmen were seen in the vicinity.
In other business yesterday into this morning, police:
- asked residents of a Tamworth Hill Avenue bed and breakfast to evacuate after a carbon monoxide alarm went off at 9:22 a.m.; the alarm was faulty, it transpired.
- arrested Patrick Dekelshoft, 36, of 280 Main Street, for an open container at 10:55 a.m.
- were told that the MBTA gates at Broadway had become inadvertently stuck in the "up" position at 12:40 p.m.; by 1:15 p.m., an MBTA gate operator had fixed the problem.
- sent several youths hiking in the forest behind Greenwood on their way at 1:50 p.m.
- reported that a 2:43 p.m. call regarding further Hartshorne House vandalism was unfounded.
- reported that a 4:30 p.m. call regarding another altercation among youths was unfounded.
- stopped a foreigner on crossing marked lanes at Albion Street at 6:22 p.m.; the foreigner produced valid American and Romanian licenses.
- deported to Audubon Road a man who had received an eviction notice and refused to leave his apartment at Audubon Apartments at 7:47 p.m.
- impounded the car of a Maple Street man who used it to trespass onto the Breakheart Reservation at 9:59 p.m.
The fire legion was summoned for a complaint of mild shaking from two separate houses on Ames Street, and another house on Morel Circle, at 7:41 a.m. Thursday morning. It transpired that a 2.1-magnitude intraplate earthquake had occurred to the southwest in Stoneham. The Stoneham P.D. also reported shaking complaints. This marks the first intraplate quake felt in the Wakefield area since a 2.8-magnitude quake centered in Reading on January 2, 2006.
Townies lose again...
21-6 against Greater Good of Peabody
-PEABODY
-Wakefield's Townies suffered a bone-breaking loss to Peabody Thursday night at Wilks Field in Peabody, with pitcher Alex J. Rustin, despite a 3-0 record on the season, flopping for the first time this year and giving up 14 runs. The game ended in the bottom 4th by way of the mercy rule as Peabody took a 15-run lead. (Mercy rule holds that: if a 15-run lead is obtained by a team before the middle of the 5th, the game ends.) Jay Ristemorio homered a career-best thrice, including a grand slam in the 3rd. "Rock" David Houlton drove in a two-run sailor to right field to give Peabody a 15-run lead, and, thus, a win via the mercy rule inducing a forced forfeit for Wakefield. The Townies face Salem Saturday night in Salem.
Wakefield 15/16s continue winning streak in stairball
Obliterate rival Tyngsboro 37-17 in game littered with whistles.
-WAKEFIELD
-Wakefield can add another "W" to their standings after the 15/16 Year-Old Stairball team obliterated their fierce rival Tyngsboro yesterday afternoon at Yueull Field and Stairwell in Wakefield. Wakefield immediately took the upper hand in a game littered with whistles for stops, struglles, offsides, steals, slides, and out-of-bounds crashes. "When the whistle's being blown that often, it can be hard to keep your composure to play well," said Wakefield coach Teddy Ryan, "and that's why I'm proud of the performance my guys were able to pull off tonight." Wakefield and Tyngsboro combined for an unprecedented 226 stops, 29 struggles, 27 offsides, 67 steals, 89 slides, and 72 out-of-bounds crashes. Wakefield alone had 63 out-of-bounds crashes and 157 stops. While no number has been set, it can be reliably predicted that the whistle blew an astounding 510 times. The game took almost five hours to finish, down from the normal 3 1/2 hours. "In most games, the whistle only blows about half that amount of times," said Ryan. This, we remind you, was a game that took 5 hours to play for only 48 minutes of actual ball-in-play time. "It was a long, exhuasting game," said Ryan, "but Tyngsboro let their guard down and we didn't, so we come out with a 'W.'"
