June 11 Town Council meeting – your midnight review

The highs and lows of Charlestown’s town government

Elyse LaForest, National Parks Service Federal Lands to Parks Program
speaks at June 11 Town Council meeting

By Will Collette

The Monday June 11 Town Council meeting was, as expected, packed with drama as our deeply divided town and dysfunctional Town Council grappled with several issues that have made Charlestown so dysfunctional.

Despite running almost half an hour overtime, the Council left several big issues to be dealt with at a second June Council meeting, now scheduled for June 25^th.

Three real biggies left over until June 25^th are Ruth Platner’s Power Grab (also known as Ordinance #349), the CRACers’Creation, the seven proposed Charter revision questions and….Charlestown’s new zombie issue, Y-Gate.

After a nice start to the meeting, the formal acceptance of Police Chief Jack Shippee’s retirement and a starting ovation tribute to the Chief as he received a commendation from the Council, it was all downhill from there.

Federal overseer Charlie Vandemoer spoke several times during the
Council meeting about how he just wanted to "improve communications"

Because, right after the tribute to Chief Shippee, the discussion moved directly into the Battle for Ninigret Park, a discussion that consumed most of the evening’s meeting.

Tonight, I’ll only cover the rough outline of what happened and will follow up with more detailed analysis.

After a long debate filled with contentious and opposing remarks and some pretty tense dialogue, in the end, the Council arrived at what I can best describe as a “confused consensus.”

That consensus was that it would be a good idea for Charlestown to have a policy where people talk to each other, that problems are best solved early rather than later but that we’re not exactly sure how to do that, especially in the highly charged climate that is Charlestown.

The Town Council voted unanimously to direct Town Solicitor Peter Ruggiero to write something, maybe a memorandum of understanding, or a resolution or a policy that promotes early and constructive conversation between the town and our federal overseer, Charlie Vandemoer of the Fish and Wildlife Service about issues of mutual interest related to the National Wildlife Refuge and Ninigret Park.

Elyse LaForest, regional director for the Interior Department’s Federal Parks to Lands Program – and the only Interior official with some actual jurisdiction over Ninigret Park – made a presentation and stayed to answer questions throughout the whole debate.

(Click to enlarge) Just pretend Slattery never introduced this motion last
March. After all, he says it doesn't mean what it says

Interestingly, she said she did not want to be included in the MOU or resolution or whatever, (a) because she has 400+ parks in 20 states to cover, (b) doesn’t want that level of detailed involvement in Charlestown and (c) feels she already has what she needs in the deed to the 172 acres of Ninigret Park where the Park Service still retains some control.

But Charlie Vandemoer, our federal overseer and de facto sixth Town Council member, really wanted a piece of whatever happens. He really wants to be in on Charlestown politics, it's now clear.

However, he also clearly felt like he needed to step back from his prior, more aggressive posture. He and CCA Councilor Deputy Dan Slattery both made it clear that all they really wanted was “improved communications.”

So ignore Deputy Dan’s previous motions and ignore Charlie Vandemoer’s letters and e-mails where he interjected himself into town issues. All the boys want is “improved communications.”

I hope that means that Vandemoer won’t be writing any more stab-in-the-back letters as he did when he wrote to RIDEM to kill the funding for sports lights with no effort to talk to the town first..

I’ll give you more blow-by-blow analysis in subsequent articles. Tonight, all you get is the rough outline.

The Town Council also approved, without a Boss Tom Gentz tirade, a full liquor license for the Breachway Grill.

But in a spiteful move, the Council accepted Gentz's push to advertise a proposed parking ban ordinance aimed at hurting Rob Lyon’s marina business, over Lyons’ attempt to object.

Boss Gentz overruled Lyons as Lyons attempted to say that Gentz had promised there would be meetings to attempt to work out parking disputes before an ordinance was introduced. But hey, that’s why I call him Boss Gentz. I guess I guess Gentz felt it was OK to ignore that promise because he doesn't have an MOU with Rob.

The town awarded, without discussion or debate, the redlight camera contract to SenSys, the company that falsely claimed it was Rhode Island-based and 100% America, or at least as much as you can be when you’re based in Miami and are the marketer for a Swedish parent company.

And we have a lighting ordinance!!! I’m glad for that, though what’s left of the ordinance isn’t much, plus what’s left of it still has some flaws.

For example, Beth Richardson made the interesting point that the ordinance requires lighting to be confined to below a “90 degree horizontal plane.” As a professional carpenter, Beth knows a little bit about angles and she noted that there is no such thing as a “90-degree horizontal plane.”

Planning Commissar Ruth Platner was stumped by that question and had to fall back on saying they had copied that language from somewhere else.

Beth’s husband Mac asked about waterfront lighting and the prohibition against any lights above 3 feet. “What if you’re trying to filet some fish on the dock? He asked, “How are you going to see what you’re doing?”

Frank Glista and Rob Lyons both challenged the 15 foot height limitation for commercial pole lighting or sign illumination, noting instances where that’s just not practical. That led to a discussion about where the 15 foot limit came from. Again, Platner’s answer was that they copied it from somewhere else.

Dr. Lew Johnson, Charlestown's long-time dark sky champion, said he was told by the building inspector in Tolland, CT that 15 foot limits were a good idea. Without some reasonable limit, a property owner could erect ridiculously tall lights that, even though downward facing and full cut-off, still bother the neighbors.

The Council made one minor amendment to the Ordinance, striking section 152-22-1 that dealt with building mounted lighted signs, but left the general 15 foot limit in and approved the amended ordinance.

They then passed a resolution directly the Planning Commission to research the 15 foot height limitation and report back to the Council on what they find at the August meeting.

The Council began the public hearing on Ruth Platner’s Power Grab, Ordinance #349, but didn’t finish. Time ran out and the Council members argued about whether to extend or simply stop and carry the hearing over to June 25. In the end, they voted to continue the public hearing on Platner’s big move until June 25.

At this point, Boss Gentz tried to rush through several pet issues. One was the previously mentioned no-parking, anti-Rob Lyons ordinance.

Gentz tried to lead the Zombie attack on June 11 but was pushed
back to June 25. Get ready for another attack!

The other was Y-Gate. 

Gentz, with no time remaining on the clock (actually 20 minutes into overtime), had the gall to suggest they simply finish up the Y-Gate transaction – i.e. give the Charlestown Land Trust the $400,000 in town taxpayer money they wanted so they could buy the YMCA camp.

Even Gentz’s cohort, Deputy Dan Slattery said uh, uh, no way, so that issue is carried over till June 25.

I wish I could say the Battle for Ninigret Park and the Lighting Ordinance are now over and done with as contentious town issues. However,there are still more than enough loose ends for future fights. The seeds are also planted for a terrible June 25 June meeting continuation and a really bad July meeting.

I think lighting is pretty close to being a none issue now. We’ll see what Peter does with the Ninigret Park MOU/resolution/policy/whatever. If he threads the needle and sticks with the warm and fuzzy “improve communication” theme, that issue might have run its course, too.

But there’s still the Zombie on the loose. Get ready for the June 25 Battle Royal over Y-Gate in the on-going struggle for Charlestown's soul.