A
very touchy subject for the CCA
By
Will Collette
If
it wasn’t for the Charlestown Citizens Alliance, I would have very little to
write about. Indeed, the CCA provides an endless stream of straight lines as
they bumble around providing their version of leadership to our town.
I
was especially taken by the CCA Council members' hilarious proposals at the January 14 Town
Council meeting.
Throughout this relatively short meeting, it was one thing after another.
There
was Council boss Tom Gentz
proposing that Charlestown build a mile and a half long bike path and walkway
to Town Beach.
All it would take is an unspecified amount of money and the willingness of each and every single property owner on the western side of Charlestown Beach Road to
voluntarily donate at least four feet of their front yards so Tom and Dan
Slattery and everyone else can ride their bikes to the beach.
Then
there was their rejection
of a simple resolution saying that they supported Chariho School
Superintendent Barry Ricci’s position that Chariho taxpayers should not have to
spend public money to send children to charter schools if those charter schools
provide an inferior education.
But
apparently my lampooning of yet another bit of silliness by our CCA leaders
really got under the skin of an ever-touchy CCA supporter base. I described an
odd debate that pitted CCA Councilor Dan Slattery against his CCA colleagues
Boss Gentz and George Tremblay, as well as litigant Councilor Lisa DiBello.
For
perhaps the first time ever, I found myself on Slattery’s side
as he pressed for the town to take action to require beach property owners to
clean up the storm debris that still remains on many properties. Slattery said
most of the errant property owners were non-residents.
His
Council colleagues thought Slattery was being much too harsh to actually expect
our non-resident beach property owners to (a) obey the law; (b) not be pigs and
(c) act in their own self-interest.
Councilor DiBello was so excited by the idea that she wants the town to use its emergency phone notification system, called Code Red, to make three or four robo-calls to solicit Charlestown residents to volunteer. I’m not making that up, either.
I
found this whole idea hilariously ridiculous. I still do. But there’s at least
one reader who thinks I should be ashamed of myself. Of course, this person is anonymous,
but boy, he or she sure is pissed off. Here’s what he/she has to say to me:
Wow.
You are one angry, spiteful man. So apparently any suggestion of having a
community beach clean up should be tabled and mocked until you have achieved
your goal of preventing anyone richer than you from owning a beach front home?
Perhaps you are going to propose having the taxpayers subsidize beachfront
houses to the tune of a few million dollars so they can be considered
"affordable housing" Sure, we could house more people by rehabbing
existing affordable housing rather than providing Aid to Families with
Dependent Contractors (and union organizers) but your way of subsidizing
unaffordable housing to provide low income individuals with better homes than
the taxpayers providing the subsidy has so much upside - specifically that it
will allow you to get on board with a community beach cleaning!
This anonymous message gave me a lot to think about.
Do I need anger management? Do I have class envy? Do I really want to turn
beach front property into affordable housing? And if so, why would I want to do that? If not, where in
the hell did this anonymous person get this stuff?
What did my commentary on the
idea of mobilizing residents to clean up the properties of irresponsible,
absentee property owners have to do with affordable housing anyway? Why does
this person think I somehow oppose retrofitting existing housing?
What is this person’s point other than he or she thinks I’m a commie because I think the idea of dragooning residents into cleaning up vacation properties for Earth Day is stupid?
What is this person’s point other than he or she thinks I’m a commie because I think the idea of dragooning residents into cleaning up vacation properties for Earth Day is stupid?
And I have enough guts to put my name on the stuff I write so why doesn’t he/she?
In fact, none of what this anonymous crank said bears any resemblance to what I actually wrote. While I admit to a very high degree of snark in my article, I basically supported Dan Slattery's proposal that the town should tell property owners that it's long past due for them to clean up their property. Anybody who reads my stuff knows how it pains me to be on Dan Slattery's side.
Look, I don’t care if all the CCA people want to
toddle down to the beach and clean up all the Floridians’ properties before
they arrive on Memorial Day. Go for it. In fact, the CCA should definitely do
this for all those out-of-staters to
repay them for funding the CCA’s 2012 election campaign.
While they’re at it, they can wash their windows,
re-paint their trims, plant some flowers and polish their lawn jockeys. This is
just the sort of public service project that fits the CCA culture and
philosophy.
So why not make it a requirement that every
full-time resident is obligated to give at least one day – let’s make it Earth
Day to keep Lisa DiBello happy – of free labor and spend it cleaning up the property
of absentee owners.
That way, when the town activates the Code Red
robo-call system, you’ll get a recorded message like this:
“Citizens. You
are required to report to the Ninigret Park parking area at 6 AM on April 22.
From there you will be taken to sites along the Charlestown shore to perform
clean-up and maintenance at private properties until sundown. This duty
is compulsory and there will be severe penalties for failure to report. Have a
nice day!”