After almost 10 months of negotiating with the town over flooding on his property he claims began after Shore Drive was reconstructed, Jerry Parenti has mixed feelings over the solution selectmen offered him on Sept. 21.

According to Parenti, his troubles started around Thanksgiving of last year when rain water run-off from the newly rebuilt roadway began collecting in his front yard rather than reaching a catch basin at the edge of his property. With the road now pitched toward his Arlington Pond beachfront, the water that did not settle in his yard washed away his beach sand as well, Parenti said.

When he approached the town about the problem, Parenti said he was given a swale – essentially a ditch that would carry the water to a catch basin – and when that failed to alleviate the flooding he was promised the installation of a buried pipe. That plan met with complications after the contractor widened the road by about a foot and a half during the final coating of asphalt by Parenti’s estimation that would have necessitated uprooting a Japanese elm tree on his property to work.

Fed up, Parenti took his problems to selectmen earlier this month. On Sept. 21 the governing board opted to direct the town manager to proceed with plans to have the drainage pipe installed after the contractor removed the extra width of asphalt and work out additional details to prevent the further erosion of his beachfront.

Still, Parenti said the experience had been frustrating.

“I’m happy, but I’m not happy,” Parenti said as he made his way out of town hall.

“I’m going to be working with the town manager until they come in and take care of it.”

Town Engineer Robert Puff told selectmen that while the solution was a fair mitigation of the problem, Parenti was receiving the “diamond treatment” and said that he believed a swale would correct the situation.

“My suggestion is to have them cut back the paved area to the appropriate width, regrade the swale, restabilize it with loam and seed. The work is in error of the contractor, so it’s at no cost to the town,” he said.

According to Puff, the installation of a drainage pipe would cost the municipality somewhere between $4,000 and $6,000.

Parenti is not the only resident of Shore Drive coming forward with concerns that the reconstructed road has negatively affected their property.

Selectman Patrick Hargreaves said at the Sept. 21 meeting that he had received a number of concerns from residents via e-mail. According to Puff, the engineering department expected to have a final list of problems sent out to the contractor, F.L. Merril, by Sept. 22.