Special Town Meeting is coming up on May 21 at 8 p.m. in the Wareham High School auditorium.

There are 17 articles on the warrant, many of them routine ones to address contracts between the town of Wareham and various employee unions. Most of those negotiations have yet to be completed as of the current printing, and it is unclear whether those articles will be ready to be voted on by the time Special Town Meeting starts.

The remaining articles include an amendment to the town charter to require a candidate for elected office to be a registered voter for one year, a gift of land on Tobey Road, the purchase of a police pick-up truck, and adjustments to this year's budget.

The Onset Fire District's annual meeting will also be held on May 21, beginning at 7:30 p.m. at the Dudley L. Brown VFW in Onset. Officials said that due to the district's bylaws, the meeting had to be scheduled for that specific date.

A quorum of 150 voters is necessary for the Special Town Meeting to occur. If a quorum cannot be obtained, it will be rescheduled to the following Wednesday.

Election-eligibility amendment to Town Charter

Voters will be asked to weigh in on a proposed amendment to the Town Charter that requires all candidates running for elected office to be a registered voter in Wareham for at least one year before the date of an election.

Candidates for election are currently required to be registered voters in Wareham, according to Town Clerk Mary Ann Silva, but the Town Charter does not specify a term of time in which a person must be registered before running for office.

The issue of a residency requirement for elected officers came up during the April 3 election, when rumors circulated that Board of Selectmen candidate Amit Johar did not live in Wareham. A challenge was filed with the Town Clerk's office but was ultimately dismissed due to procedural errors made in the filing of the challenge.

Johar ultimately lost the election to current Selectman Peter Teitelbaum.

Proposed expansion of Tobey Road

Bayside Agricultural Inc., the owner of property along the intersection of Tobey Road and Cranberry Highway, proposes to give or to permanently allow the use of the land to the town in order to make Tobey Road wider, said Iain Ward, spokesman for Bayside Agricultural.

The proposal is in light of Walmart's proposed move from its East Wareham location to West Wareham, which is currently going through the approval process with the Zoning Board of Appeals.

Walmart's proposed West Wareham location is an approximately 26-acre parcel of land at the corner of Tobey Road and Cranberry Highway. Part of that land is directly across the street from Bayside Agricultural.

Bayside Agricultural representatives are proposing to give the town 8,000 square-feet of land in front of their property, which would allow for three southbound lanes to be constructed on part of Tobey Road. There is currently only one southbound lane.

The added space would also allow Tobey Road to be aligned with Tow Road, the street that sits opposite to Tobey Road but is currently misaligned a bit to the east.

The misalignment of the two roads means that cars on Cranberry Highway and Tobey Road must have a red light when cars on Tow Road have a green light, said Ward.

"Traffic on Cranberry Highway and Tobey Road all have to stop when Tow Road gets a green. … When you line [Tobey Road and Tow Road] up, then the same signal can be used for Tow and Tobey," Ward said.

Ward said that according to Jacobs Engineering, the firm that performed a traffic study for Bayside Agricultural, there will be about 20 seconds of increased green light time on Cranberry Highway with the proposed expansion.

The added space would also increase driver access to Bayside Agricultural from Tobey Road. According to current plans, access to the Bayside property would be blocked by a traffic island.

"Widening Tobey Road will accommodate increased traffic, it fixes the alignment problem on Tobey Road and Tow Road … and it maintains and improves the access to our property," said Ward.

Bayside Agricultural will only gift or permanently allow the use of their land if a retail development such as Walmart ends up moving into the proposed West Wareham location, Ward said.

Voting positively on the article does not automatically mean that the town will accept the land, Ward explained. It gives the Board of Selectmen the authority to accept the gift of land.

A diagram of Bayside's proposed changes to the intersection is available below this story.

A new police pick-up truck

Special Town Meeting voters will be asked to approve the purchase of a 2012 Dodge Ram pick-up for $19,900, which will be used by the Wareham Police Department.

The pick-up truck will replace an older police truck that was hit by another driver and deemed a total loss.

The list price of the pick up truck is $24,400. The price for additional police necessities, including lights and a police radio, is $4,500, making the total price $28,900. Because the insurance settlement for the truck is $9,000, the end price of the vehicle is $19,900.

Town employee union contracts

Two town employee unions — the Wareham Police Union and a union of Wareham Free Library employees — have reached negotiation agreements with the town. Special Town Meeting members will vote to fund those agreements.

The rest of the contracts appearing on the warrant are still in negotiations and may not be finalized by May 21, said Derek Sullivan, the town's financial analyst.