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| January 27, 2006 Barnstable Patriot |  |
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The cure for the
common winter
Osterville's
Chocolate Fest
sweetens up
cold Cape days
By Heather Wysocki
hwysocki@barnstablepatriot.com
Winter on Cape Cod is
cold, damp, and dreary.
But Ostervfile 's Business
andProfessional'sAssocia-
tion wants to change that
description to rich, dark ,
and chocolaty.
Osterville is holding its
first Chocolate Festival
on Saturday, Feb. 11, to
celebrate Valentine's Day
and, "spark some energy
into Osterville during win-
ter," said Nicole Merriman,
owner of Hot Diggity in
Osterville and a member
of the OBPA.
"February is the ulti-
mate chocolatemonth,"she
said. And, because many
activities and programs
close during the winter,
she thinks it could be the
ultimate month for avillage
celebration as well.
After brainstorming ses-
sions this summer, mem-
bers of the OBPA decided
upon the festival in order to
bring business to Osterville
during a traditionally slow
period.
"Our goal was to get
the village together to do
something exciting and
fun," Merriman said.
The festival, which will
feature a chocolate tast-
ing contest , music, and
special events at stores on
Main Street in Osterville,is
inspired by the "traditional
Valentine 's spirit with a
twistof chocolate,"saidJim
Power, another member of
the OBPA who is involved
in organizing the event.
One of the most antici-
pated events is the choco-
late tasting contest , which
will feature "both chefs
and non-chefs," said Mer-
riman.
Any entry - as long as it
includes chocolate-willbe
accepted andjudged from 2
to 4 p.m.The tastingisopen
to members of the public,
who willbe able tojudge all
the entries; prizes will be
awarded to the best.
The OBPA is expecting
to see everything from "the
average chocolate chip
cookie to the decadent
dessert you would see on
the menu at a restaurant ,"
Merriman said.
Tickets to participate in
the contest are$5and avail-
able at Hot Diggity and at
Upstairs Imports, both on
Main Street in Osterville.
All proceeds from the tick-
ets will be donated to the
Osterville Food Pantry.
Merriman and the OBPA
decided to donate proceeds
from the festival to the
food pantry because it goes
along with the fest's food
theme.
"It is aperfect cause,near
the Valentine's weekend ,"
said Power.
Power believes the con-
test and other activities
will bring people looking
to celebrate Valentine 's
Day, people wanting to get
CONTINUED ON PAGE B:3
0, Osterville,
wherefore art
thou Osterville?
Village identity
easier to find than
boundary lines
By Paul Gauvin
pgauvin@barnstablepatriot.com
BOOK OF BOUNDS-FrankSchlegel,town engineeringrecords manager,
aches for Osterville boundary lines.
PLENTY OF MAPS - Plenty
of corners in Town Hall have
maps, but none provide definitive
boundaries for Osterville or other
villages.
Two
fellows are head-
ing toward one
another while walking
alongside a tree-lined road.
As they pass, one fellow
utters a derogatory remark,
which prompts the offended
passerby to exclaim with
aristocratic huff, "Sir. You
are totally out of bounds!"
To which the offender re-
torts: "A serious charge, sir.
Can you prove it."
If they were walking on
the landward fringes of
Osterville, there would be
no way to ascertain beyond
a reasonable doubt in what
village they were walking
when the incident occurred.
To find out, they could
huff 'n puff up three flights
of stairs at Town Hall to
visit Jim Benoit of the map-
making GIS department,
evoking, in the process, a
quote from Juliet: "How art
thou out of breath when
thou hast breath to say
to me that thou art out of
breath?"
Shakespeare aside, surely
Benoit would have impres-
sive aerial images with big
black lines delineating the
exact bounds of the seven
villages.
Not exactly. "We took the
lines from old zoning maps
that weren't accurate," Ben-
oit explains. He suggests
a chat with town surveyor
Bob Golden down the hall.
Ah! To be assured then,
the practitioner of such an
exact science as surveying
could precisely document
the bounds between the
villages.
But Mr. Golden would tell
them he hasn't held this
job too long and that he is
not able to render precise
answers concerning village
boundaries. He would say
there is a good reason for
that: Certified boundaries
between the town's seven
villages do not exist.
He says that if one really
had to have an exact bound-
ary, either the town council
or town manager would
have to order up a survey.
It would be a big job - and
one that could, as they say,
make a wave, in this case,
perhaps a discombobulating
tsunami.
To explain why, Golden
would refer the fellows to a
most accommodating town
agent tucked in a record-
filled corner office across
the hall that catches the
afternoon sun through half-
closed blinds. "Let there
be light," the fellows would
think to themselves. "Where
oh where does Osterville
begin and end?"
Frank Schlegel, the town's
engineering records man-
ager and E-911 data liaison,
has been on the job for 21
years and has driven just
about every road in town.
Finally, there is somebody
with exact village boundar-
ies.
Wrong.
Schlegel, who is respon-
sible for accurate addresses
in town to assure quick and
precise responses to E- (for
enhanced) 911 emergency
calls, doesn't have accurate
village margins either, and
he doesn't really care be-
cause other boundaries are
doing the job for him.
Precise bounds became
important with the advent
of E-911 in 1995. That,
Schlegel says, is because
most of the villages du-
plicate street names. "For
example, we have seven
Main streets in the town of
Barnstable," he says, a situ-
ation that was unacceptable
to exacting federal and state
governments directing 911.
There is no room for ap-
proximism in the emergency
system. "There could be no
duplicate road names unless
they were in well defined
areas," Schlegel said.
The feds required regis-
tered boundaries separat-
ing the streets of the same
name in separate villages or
districts. Schlegel says the
most precise boundaries
were those of fire districts.
So they, not village lines,
were used to implement 911.
The other set of exact
boundaries involve the
town's 13 political precincts,
none of which attempt to
set village margins.
CONTINUED ON PAGE B:3
Qyrue cbove.
FALL IN LOVE AGAIN THIS VALENTINE'S WEEKEND , FEBRUARY
10-14, AT THE REGATTA. SWOON OVER OUR CREATIVE
VALENTINE'S MENU WHILE YOU CHERISH EACH OTHER'S COM -
PANY IN THE MOST ROMANTIC RESTAURANTON CAPE COD.
THE REGATTA AND VALENTINE'S DAY - MADE FOR EACH
OTHER. CALL 508.428.5715 FOR RESERVATIONS.
Sk