Classic example of how to screw up a consensus
By Will Collette
It was no surprise that the Town Council decided to go ahead
with the $2,114,415 purchase of the site of the proposed Whalerock wind farm.
This issue passed the point of getting on everyone’s last nerve months and
months ago, and had been causing mass hysteria on the moraine.
Support spans
the spectrum – even Ruth Platner and I were on the same side, at least as far
as the merits of the town buying the land.
However, the CCA Party Council majority rejected calls from
many citizens that a purchase this big should go before the voters to honor the
CCA Council members’ past promises and past precedents, if not the strictures
of the Town Charter. But Town Council Boss Tom Gentz insisted that this is the
way it had to be, and hey, he IS Boss Gentz and he had the votes of his two CCA
Party colleagues (Deputy Dan Slattery and George Tremblay) and their ally
Councilor Lisa DiBello.
Only Councilor Paula Andersen (D) voted no, not because she
opposed the purchase, but because she wanted the Council to honor the
democratic process, past promises and precedent.
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| The CCA Party sez "we don't need no steekin' voting" |
The town will be getting less land for its money, it turns
out. Some of the land in the two house lots being carved out of the land – land
that Larry LeBlanc’s partner wants to develop – contained steeply sloped land
and that made the lots too small to meet Charlestown’s current zoning
ordinance. The recently passed “slopes”
bill, opposed by Charlestown
and other rural towns, would have allowed the smaller lots with the sloped
land, but that new legislation doesn’t kick in until the New Year[1].
And the Council and the Whalerock developers want to do the
sale immediately. So there goes three acres[2].
Apparently, one of the factors that made Gentz and his cronies toss their past
promises to put this matter up to a vote is the threat by Whalerock’s lawyer
John Kenyon (attorney for James Barrows) that his client was NOT willing to see
the matter go to a vote[3].
He said that if the matter went to the taxpayers, his client would want to
continue the goddawful Zoning Board appeal process[4].
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| Here comes another CCA Party con job, just in time for International Talk Like a Pirate Day (September 19) |
Some of the same players who were central figures in last
year’s Y-Gate scandal, among them Charlestown Land Trust leader Russ Ricci[5],
lined up to boost the idea of granting a conservation easement to the Trust, or
perhaps the Nature Conservancy or some other group, rather than keep the land
under the town’s exclusive ownership.
Charlestown, it’s time to hold on to your wallets, again.
Charlestown, it’s time to hold on to your wallets, again.
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| Boss Gentz reads his resolution. Councilor DiBello looks like she wishes she was someplace else. |
What do those taxpayers get when Gentz and Platner give it
away? As we learned during last year’s battle over the aborted YMCA camp deal,
control by outside groups often means restrictions on the use and access to
land by Charlestown residents[7].
If the Town Council majority had hoped that they could make
the Whalerock nightmare go away by taking tonight’s vote to go ahead and spend
every nickel of Open Space/Recreation money the town has left, without taking a
vote, they should have thought through their plans for the future use of the
land.
The CCA Council majority is going to take a bit of a hit for
breaking their promises and ignoring the democratic process, but I think a lot
of Charlestown voters have gotten used to their dishonorable conduct.
As long as the CCA Party can get its big turn-outs in Charlestown’s third precinct[8], they can continue to tell the rest of Charlestown's residents to go screw themselves.
But the land giveaway keeps this issue alive by taking it into an entirely different direction.
As long as the CCA Party can get its big turn-outs in Charlestown’s third precinct[8], they can continue to tell the rest of Charlestown's residents to go screw themselves.
But the land giveaway keeps this issue alive by taking it into an entirely different direction.
Whereas I believe there was and is a genuine majority, if
not consensus, supporting the town’s acquisition of the Whalerock property, I
doubt support is there for paying $2 million and then giving it away.
There’s also the small matter of town law. Under the Town
Charter, the Town Council cannot simply give away the land, or in this case, an
interest[9]
in the land, no matter what Boss Gentz and his cronies decide. Here’s the
relevant part of the Charter:
Manner of conveying real estate or
changing use.
[Amended 11-7-2006] The town, by
ordinance enacted by the council specifying at least generally the terms,
conditions, manner of sale, lease or change in use, and describing at least
generally the particular property to be sold, leased, conveyed or have its use
changed, may from time to time sell, lease, convey or use for any other public
or municipal purpose or purposes, or for any purpose whatsoever (subject to approval by vote of any Budget Public Hearing after special
mention has been made and notice given of the proposal in the warrant issued
for the warning of that meeting), any real estate or interests therein owned by
the town which have been purchased, acquired, used or dedicated in any manner
for municipal or other public purposes, whenever, in the opinion of the Council
and the Budget Public Hearing, said real estate or interests therein have
become unsuitable or have ceased to be used for such purposes. In the same
manner the town may sell, lease or convey any real estate or interests therein
held in its proprietary capacity and not dedicated or devoted to public use.
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| What's the future of the Temple of Turbomania? |
Personally, I am glad the town is going to buy the Whalerock
property.
I also believe it should go to a vote, but the CCA Party leaders don’t,
and they control the Council and the rest of town government. They can count on Town Solicitor Peter Ruggiero to give them a "legal" opinion that lines up with what they want to do.
I will be glad to hear the last from the crazies
on the moraine. I will be glad to know that those farcical, frankly
embarrassing, Zoning Board hearings will not continue.
I also hope Charlestown will focus on real issues rather
than imaginary ones. The residents fighting the Copar
Quarries are dealing with real threats to their homes and health and deserve
fair and equal support from the town, at least as much as the town gave the anti-wind power NIMBYs.
However, this issue will morph into something different that
promises to be yet another ugly and divisive battle if the CCA Party pushes its
idea to give the land away. They just can’t be content with resolving this one
crisis without creating another one.
They will have a chance, once again, to demonstrate to
Charlestown voters that their real agenda has nothing to do with the majority
of residents, voters and taxpayers, but with gifting their political supporters
and campaign donors with public resources they simply do not deserve.
Well, here’s to the likely end of one fight, and the
beginning of another.
Footnotes
[1]
Funny how this kind of issue comes around and bites you in the ass.
[2] Boss
Gentz noted that the lead negotiators for the town were Town Administrator Mark
Stankiewicz and Town Solicitor Peter Ruggiero. I guess they took time out from
their other big priority – burying
town records in mayonnaise jars under I-95 bridge abutments in Providence.
[3]
Frank Glista stood and testified that this was “blackmail.” Joe Dolock raised
the point that skipping the vote could lead to more litigation and that getting
voter approval puts this purchase on much more solid legal ground.
[4]
Believe me, the last thing I want to see is more of those poorly
run Zoning Board hearings where it was pretty clear to many that (a) the
Zoning Board was going to turn down Whalerock’s special use permit application,
but (b) were going to do so in such a faulty manner that (c) Whalerock would
likely win an appeal in Superior Court and get the green light to build the
turbines. But Frank Glista was right to call it blackmail.
[5] It’s
worth
re-reading some of that Y-Gate material, especially about the secret meetings and
deals and most especially Russ
Ricci’s extraordinary deposition in one of the Y-Gate lawsuits where Ricci’s
testimony underscored just how sleazy a Charlestown land deal can get.
[6]
Platner has personal ties to several of the conservation groups that could
raise significant conflict
of interest questions.
[7] We
learned during the Y-Gate Scandal that most
of the Charlestown Land Trust’s properties are only accessible by
appointment or by going along on a pre-arranged guided tour.
[8]
Charlestown has four precincts. The third precinct is in the southwest corner
and takes in East and West Beach, Quonnie, Shady Harbor and most of Charlestown’s
tonier areas.
[9] A
conservation easement is an “interest” in the land that has value. We learned a
lot about such easements during the Y-Gate Scandal.