Council Approves School, Town Energy Upgrade Measures

At Monday's night meeting, the Coventry Town Council approved a contract with Wilkinson Associates, Inc., to provide engineering services to upgrade energy performance in town buildings and in three schools. Funds are available for these upgrades from the measures passed in a referendum .

After a brief discussion by Town Council President Gary Cote, fellow board members Karen Carlson, Gregory Laboissonniere and Thaddeus Jendzejec and with Town Manager Thomas Hoover, all were convinced it was in the best short-term and long-term interest of the town to approve the contract.

"These savings will (eventually) offset the costs of improvements," said Cote.

Coventry Police Dept. Mutual Aid

Individual non-emergency mutual aid agreements between CPD and police departments in West Warwick, West Greenwich and East Greenwich were approved by the council.

"These are the first three towns that we approached," said Police Chief Bryan Volpe. "Other departments are in the process of signing reciprocal agreements with us so there will be no problems in working together in handling these calls and to avoid any liability concerns."

"These calls would be for matters such as for alarms, DUI stops and other calls," he added. "We already have mutual aid agreements in place for emergencies and are working on agreements with other towns in Rhode Island and in Connecticut."

General Assembly Requests

Council members approved the following requests of Coventry representatives in the RI General Assembly:

• To introduce and support legislation that would help the town reach the Annual Required Contribution (ARC) over five years by transitioning town employees to the Municipal Employees Retirement System. 

• To introduce and support legislation measures to grant either partial and/or full-time exemptions to property owners and businesses for the purpose of creating jobs and job opportunities, not to exceed a period of 10 years.

• To introduce and support legislation which would allow the Town Council to grant partial and/or full exemptions to property owners to encourage exterior renovations or improvements made to pre-20th century buildings within a historic district by the owners pursuant to historic guidelines and extending same to buildings outside the historic district which are on the National Register. 

"This will help bring in new business and help create new jobs for small businesses," said Cote. "We're also hoping to get grants to allow historic renovations," said Town Manager Hoover.