(April 7, 2026) – Three residents appeared at the Select Board meeting on Tuesday night, asking the board to consider establishing an elected town ombudsman position.
The residents submitted a written proposal before the meeting. This was signed by 22 residents directly impacted by the Lincoln Hill development.
Last October, the Planning Board approved a 34-unit Open Space Residential Development (OSRD) off Groton Harvard Road. A contractor began blasting ledge in early January to prepare the site.
A month later, there was a large “flying rock” incident that discharged onto a residential property, damaging a shed, according to the Town of Ayer’s Feb. 5th social media post. A resident who attended the Special Planning Board meeting on Feb. 12th stated her shed and roof were both damaged.
The Town of Ayer and the State Fire Marshal’s office both issued “Stop Work” orders, which have since been lifted.
The ombudsman proposal comes about two months after the blasting property damage.
This states in part,
“We are recommending the creation of a dedicated Town Ombudsman position elected by the people of Ayer to act as a neutral, independent resource between residents and Town Administration; an involved and voting participant at Town and Committee/Board meetings, representing the best interest of existing residents. To be clear, this is not a role to be absorbed by existing staff who already carry full workloads. It should be a new, standalone position built on recognized ombudsman standards.”
The proposal described a multi-step search process, which includes convening a hiring committee where both the Town and resident representatives have seats at the table. Next, there would be “get to know you” interviews in a public forum, then a town-wide ballot to elect the ombudsman.
“The primary thing is, in the planning of anything in town, how is it going to affect existing residents?,” the proponent said. “Negatively, positively, how do we improve that dynamic between the town and the residents so everyone is on the same page all the time, so no one is feeling slighted.”
Then, she opened her folder of requests. The ones marked green had positive outcomes, the ones marked in blue had no response. This is where an ombudsman could help, she said.
The Select Board chair said she had chatted with the lead resident about this, then the proposal came in and it wasn’t what she envisioned.
Three Select Board Members Respond
All three Select Board members spoke, along with a town employee who gave some input from the meeting table and one from the audience, off-camera. The Town Manager sat at the meeting table and did not share any comments. The Fire Chief and a Planning Board member watched from the back row. That’s as far as we could see on the meeting video.
After months of residents sending town employees emails, the Select Board chair advised everyone to take a breath when they type or read something. She acknowledged everyone’s feelings as valid and hope they left the room feeling that they were heard.
She also spoke up for the town employees.
“The people in this building take their jobs very seriously,” she said. “They want to be able to walk down a sidewalk and knowing that when they run into a resident, they’ve done right by their resident. And the resident, at the same time, wants to come here and feel like they’ve been doing right. So we all need to take our bruises on this one and find a new way.”
A second Select Board member said residents can communicate with elected officials and he doesn’t see the need to have a whole other person sit in on meetings.
The resident shared her experience with the Planning Board: “We came to the meeting; we spoke; we were dismissed. Literally dismissed.”
The third Select Board member said he appreciated that the resident saw an issue and came in with a proposed solution. He did say he feels the Select Board members act as ombudsman. In reviewing the proposal, he said he took notes and considered the thoughts. He also said he feels this position could end up doing 100 hours of work each week and that would be setting someone up for failure.
He shared this among his comments, “Every person who’s come to me, I’ve talked to them. I always say I can listen to you, I can sympathize. I can try to do right by you, but in the end, it might not be what we can do. But I can certainly listen and try to explain.”
After 35 minutes of discussion, the third Select Board member made a motion to take the ombudsman proposal under advisement. This is what the board voted to do.