Plympton Board of Selectmen Approves Opioid Funds for SRO Vehicle, Pushes Back on Door Cost

PLYMPTON -- August 18, 2025, Plympton Board of Selectmen approves opioid funds for school resource officer vehicle and presses Town Properties Committee to cut costs on a contested $60,000 door replacement. The board voted unanimously Monday to use $3,500 in opioid settlement funds to wrap and outfit a retired police minivan as the school resource officer's primary vehicle, freeing an active cruiser from sitting parked at the school. A longer debate over a Community Preservation Act-funded replacement of the townhouse's Palmer Road entrance doors, bolted shut, not ADA accessible, and not in active use, ended in a 2-1 vote directing the Town Properties Committee to revisit the project "in a more fiscally responsible way," including potentially involving vocational students as a no-labor option, without formally canceling the town-meeting-approved appropriation. Community Preservation Committee Chair John Russo, citing 15 years in the role, warned the board that unwinding an approved CPA project would be "really dangerous territory" legally and as precedent, noting that the state match reduces the $60,000 appropriation to roughly $45,000 in actual taxpayer cost. Highway Superintendent Rob Furlough reported an insurance payout of just under $17,000 for a totaled flail mower, against a $34,000-to-$40,000 replacement cost, and a renegotiated waste management contract settled at about 8 percent, within the department's budgeted 10 percent ceiling.