Adams Board Wants Aggie Fair to Inform Vendors of Permit Needs

The Board of Health wants better communication with the Agricultural Fair Committee over vendor permitting.

ADAMS, Mass. — The Board of Health wants the Agricultural Fair Committee to properly communicate permit specifications to its food vendors.

Code Enforcement Officer Scott Koczela told the board last week that the fair committee does not inform food vendors that rent at Bowe Field that they have to get a permit from the town.

"They are just leaving it up to their vendors to take care of dealing with us, and they aren't taking any steps to talk to us," Koczela said. "They need to stop being so lax and work with the people that are renting their facility to because it is going to come back to get them."

Koczela said this has been a continuing issue with the committee, and it has failed to communicate with the Board of Health.

"They are not cooperating with us, and it is troubling finding out they are having these events because I will have to go down there and tell vendors they aren't opening if they don't have a permit," he said. "I know that is not going to go over well."

Koczela said he spoke with committee members a few years ago about the proper permitting they have to get when they rent the field. He said the permitting is important because it protects people from getting sick from ill-prepared or wrongly handled food.

Chairman Allen Mendel said the board will send the committee another letter asking them to cooperate and what the consequences will be if it doesn't.

"We need to work with them, and they need to work with us," Mendel said. "Communication needs to happen. We can work together, but we need cooperation."

The board also met Wednesday with housing developer Kevin Duffy, who is the executor trust holder of 58-60 Summer St.

Duffy said he wants to completely renovate the building, but needs to know how to lift the condemnation that was put on the building in 2006.

Kevin Duffy was cautioned not to do unpermitted work on a Summer Street building he's trying to acquire.

Duffy said the building is in really bad shape and is by no means livable at the moment.

"This building needs everything top to bottom. ... It has been sitting there for eight years," Duffy said. "That property was loaded with dead rats. They look like a sheet of paper when you rake them up because they don't have any bones."

He said he wants to work with the town and get the building up to code. However, Mendel said he talked to the police and heard Duffy was doing unpermitted renovations and was working on the property over the weekend.

"They said you have acquired electricity from other people's buildings and that is not playing by the rules," he said. "If you want to play by the rules you can't run extension cords across highways to work on your building; you can't come in through the back door."

Duffy said Mendel's accusation was not true and he was not in town on that weekend.

The board closed the meeting by discussing new permit fees that haven't been updated since 2004.

"What we would like to do is go over these fees and compare them with towns around us," Mendel said. "Some of those fees we have are so old and way out of line compared to other towns."

The board decided to discuss the fees at its next meeting.

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