Better to ask forgiveness than permission, Part 3

Here is a third installment of things you probably shouldn’t even think about doing in Charlestown. Click here for Part 1 and here for Part 2.

This series was inspired by the pronouncement by Charlestown Planning Commissar Ruth Platner that any use of your property that isn’t permitted in the Charlestown Code of Ordinances is prohibited.

Though Charlestown’s Code of Ordinances fills a three-inch-thick binder that sits by Town Solicitor Peter Ruggiero at every Town Council meeting, not everything that Charlestown residents may wish to do is actually covered. Even though the Code reaches very deeply into your lives – whether you know it or not – it still leaves a lot out.

And in this series, we’re looking at things that seem to have been left out. And if it isn’t in the Code, Ruth Platner says you can’t do it.

Here are some more things that don’t seem to be permitted in the Charlestown Code. …

I may have missed some activities that are prohibited for lack of permission and may also have missed some nook or cranny in our Town Code that grants permission to these putative prohibited activities. Please e-mail me at progressivecharlestown@gmail.com with additions and corrections.

Not expressly permitted so therefore prohibited

• Swing set
• Sandbox
• Play fort
• Seesaw
• Tree house
• Brightly colored house paint (e.g., the Pepto-Bismol house)
• Decorations on exterior of house
• Electricity-to-wind devices (e.g., compressor on an A/C, car fan belt, electrical fan)

Devices that turn wind into electricity ARE covered in the code. All such devices are currently prohibited under a moratorium. On September 12, the Town Council will consider whether to enact the first-in-the-nation permanent ban on wind-to-energy devices. Ms. Platner says she will see to it that the Planning Commission quickly produces an ordinance that authorizes residential wind generators, but (a) “quickly” usually means years to our Planning Commission and (b) wait till you see the restrictions they attach to any such residential ordinance.

• Birdbaths
• Bird feeders
• Birdhouses
• Corn feeder for the squirrels
• Salt lick for deer
• Deck furniture
• Gazebo
• Tree swing
• Hanging an old tire from a tree for the kids
• Hammock
• Listening to a Red Sox game while lying in hammock (or anywhere outdoors)
• Rain barrel
• Water sprinkler
• Weather station
• Weather balloon
• Weathervane
• Wind chimes

We need a discussion in Charlestown about regulation. How much do we need? What do we really need to regulate? How much is too much?

We need to look at the Code of Ordinances and begin to bring them into line with common sense. That means writing ordinances that say what we mean instead of being so overbroad - we do not need to regulate every possible contingency. We also don't need regulations that are not, cannot or will not be enforced.

We need a discussion about the powers that the Charlestown Planning Commission has taken for itself - and why the Town Council and the citizens have let them do that.

Author: Will Collette