Freetown Select Board Backs Roundabout Grant, Closes Special Town Meeting Warrant

FREETOWN — December 1, 2025 — Freetown Select Board votes to pursue $1 million Complete Streets grant for Four Corners mini roundabout. The board voted unanimously Monday to apply for the state grant, due January 6, for a mini roundabout at the intersection of Elm, North Main, South Main, and Water streets, with construction costs estimated at $840,000 or more. Highway Surveyor Chuck Speck, who has been working on the project for roughly a year, told the board that engineers strongly favor the roundabout over a traffic signal, which he estimated at $735,000 but noted both figures could run 20 percent higher. A proposed $49,120 engineering agreement with GPI for a North Main Street sidewalk failed for lack of board support — a $250,000 sidewalk appropriation lost at town meeting 87 to 69 — and was redirected to a January special town meeting warrant as a permission-only article. That warrant, now closed to submissions and headed to town counsel, includes a $1.25 million boiler replacement and a $1.17 million fire engine purchase among more than $3.6 million in capital requests.