UPDATED: Charlestown Citizens Alliance stacks the deck at Zoning

Sets course that will greatly boost lawsuits against the town

In this case, 49 minutes. For more cartoons
by P.S. Mueller, click here.

By Will Collette

The Charlestown Town Council held its regular meeting on Tuesday night, and as predicted here and in Frank Glista’s letter to the Sun, continued its partisan purge of the Zoning Board of Review (ZBR), replacing old members with new, CCA Party loyalists.

This matter took up most of the very short August 12 meeting, It is well worth your time to watch and listen to this segment of the meeting on Clerkbase (click here and hope for the best).

The Town Council majority consists of three die-hard CCA Partiers led by Council Boss Tom Gentz, his sidekick Dan Slattery and George Tremblay. In recent months, they have used their majority status to oust two long-serving ZBR members William Meyer and Richard Frank and to appoint CCA Party loyalists Mike Chambers, Cliff Vanover and now Joe Quadrato to the Zoning Board.

Dumping Meyer and Frank has been a CCA Party goal because they, and two other ZBR members, voted their interpretation of the law early on in the battle over the now dead Whalerock wind turbine project. This goal to get rid of these two particular members went public when CCA Party guru Ron Areglado publicly excoriated them at the first of last year’s long-running Whalerock hearings.

Slattery, who is not running for re-election, only has a short
time left to create his "legacy" of damage to the town

The last time a serving ZBR member was denied renewal was in July 2008. Then, it was Dr. Milton Krantz, one of the CCA Party’s founders and a current CCA Steering Committee member (even though he lives out of state). Dr. Krantz was bounced by then Council President Jim Mageau. And the angry protests came from the same CCA Party that has just repeated the act they condemned in 2008, not once but twice.

With his classic snarl, Councilor Dan Slattery intimated that there may be a third ouster about to happen, referring to, but not naming, a sitting ZBR member who has missed, according to Slattery, about 50% of the meetings. It looks like Deputy Dan has his sights set on Ron Crosson who appears to have missed more meetings than any other ZBR member. His term is set to expire in July 2016, but he might be facing an earlier departure if Dan and his posse have their way.

ZBR member Ron Crosson - is he Slattery's next target?

Slattery was in high form on Tuesday, making three motions to consolidate the CCA Party’s hold on the ZBR. His motions were to (1) elevate CCA Party website columnist and pundit Mike Chambers to full membership; (2) promote Cliff Vanover (spouse of Planning Commissar Ruth Platner) from Alternate #2 to Alternate #1 and (3) appoint CCA Party fund-raiser and Areglado follower Joe Quadrato to become Alternate #2. That still leaves one vacancy to be filled, presumably by someone from the CCA Party’s bottomless pit of people seeking patronage appointments.

Slattery was so excited by this that he actually asked Town Clerk Amy Weinreich to conduct a roll-call vote before his motions were even seconded! He was caught up short by Councilor Paula Andersen and others who noted that at least some of the proprieties needed to be honored.

Like a second to the motions. Like discussion on the motions.

CCA Party cohort George Tremblay obliged Slattery by seconding all three of his motions.

Once Slattery realized he couldn’t simply induct these three loyalists by fiat, he took a deep breath and began to extoll their virtues as careful and thoughtful people – all evidence to the contrary – and noted what great ZBR members they would be. 

ZBR Chair Mike Rzewuski is now in lock-step with
the CCA boys

He also claimed that ZBR Chair Mike Rzewuski told him that all three were fine with him.

Councilor Andersen offered a counter-point, noting that the process the CCA Party majority is using to stack the ZBR is even worse than what they complained about in 2008. She said it looked like decisions were being made by "good ole boys."

Planning Commissar Ruth Platner popped up to defend the CCA Party majority’s actions and launched into an attack on the ZBR incumbents by noting the case of the Botka Quarry controversy. Town Zoning Officer Joe Warner cited the Botka Quarry for being an illegal mine and issued a cease-and-desist order. The Botkas appealed to the ZBR. 

The ZBR heard the case on November 11, 2011 and voted 4 to 1 to overturn Joe Warner’s cease-and-desist order, on the grounds that there was evidence that mining at that site was occurring as far back as the 1950s, so the site was a mine before Charlestown adopted its zoning ordinance and thus was “grandfathered.”

The neighbors, including family members, disagreed bitterly, and given what we have all learned about what it can be like to have a quarry as a neighbor, it’s easy to see their point.

What is telling about this case, however, is that the Charlestown Town Council chose not to do what it has done in many other cases, the most familiar example being Whalerock, and that is challenge the ZBR ruling in Superior Court. Why didn't the town sue if this was such a wrong decision?

Instead, the town left it to the neighbors, including Botka's relatives, to challenge the ZBR ruling in court, where it is still pending. By contrast in the Whalerock case, Charlestown not only brought suit several times, but also hired a Special Counsel - at $50,000 cost to the taxpayers - to represent private citizens (the "anonymous abutters" who have never been identified, but who are known to be Ron Areglado and his followers). Of all the cases for Platner to raise to attack the ZBR, why this one when the rest of town government's hands are hardly clean?

Zoning Board members, unlike members of other town bodies, are sworn to follow applicable law as they see it. The Zoning Board is a “quasi-judicial” body. They must make decisions based on town and state law, even if they don’t like the outcome. Dick Frank told me that he cast his vote in favor of the Whalerock project based on the law, even though he personally did not want to see Whalerock get built.

When Platner stood up and attacked the ZBR for their decision on the Botka Quarry, she said the ZBR should take public opinion, especially opposition from neighbors, into consideration.

That may be how she runs her Planning Commission – indeed, that is exactly how she runs her Planning Commission – where politics counts more than the law. But the ZBR can’t do that without denying applicants due process under law, not to mention setting up Charlestown to lose some juicy lawsuits that will cost taxpayers big bucks.

Again, if you want an example of how that works, look at the Whalerock case where the town was left with no option to stop the project other than to spend $2.1 million to buy the property.

This is what the new CCA Party platform says....is this the kind of conduct the CCA Party leaders displayed at the August 12 Town Council meeting?

Finally, even Boss Gentz realized that Platner’s diatribe against the Zoning Board incumbents was actually completely out of order. He mildly noted that the agenda was the appointment of the new and newly appointed ZBR members, not attacks on former members or ZBR past practices.

Platner & Vanover (Charlestown Land Trust)

Councilor Paula Andersen also noted, for the record, that Ms. Platner is the spouse of one of the gentlemen being considered under Slattery’s motion – Cliff Vanover.

Then Evelyn Smith, chair of Charlestown’s Affordable Housing Commission, stepped up to the mike and dropped a bombshell. She noted that because Cliff Vanover is married to Platner, it would present a significant encumbrance to him actually performing his duties due to the conflict of interest it causes.

The Zoning Board of Review is the place where applicants go to appeal adverse decisions from the Planning Commission and Vanover would have to recuse himself from any such case. Evelyn noted that this could lead to inappropriate delays it the ZBR cannot come up with the necessary supermajority to make a quorum for an appeal hearing. That would, she asserted, deny applicants’ their due process rights.

Councilor Lisa DiBello, like many others (including me), was surprised at this revelation and she asked the Town Solicitor for a ruling. I.e. is it true that Vanover would have a conflict of interest on any case that involved the Planning Commission? Answer: yes.

In the end, that didn’t matter, since the CCA Party had the three votes it needed whether or not Councilors DiBello or Andersen voted with them. As we have seen time and again, the CCA boys do not care if their decisions are silly, overtly political or impractical – so long as it plays to their political base, that’s all that counts.

DiBello voted with the CCA boys to approve Chambers and Quadrato, who were both approved on four to one votes, with Paula Andersen voting no.

DiBello voted no on Vanover, as did Andersen, making it a party-line three to two vote in favor of Vanover.

Besides ZBR Chair Mike Rzewuski who has been making his position more secure by giving the CCA Party everything it wants, there’s one last incumbent, ZBR Vice-Chair Ray Dreczko. His term runs until July 2017. Ray was usually in the majority on the ZBR’s many four to one votes on the ZBR, including Whalerock and the Botka Quarry. Ray also ran (and lost) as a Democrat for Town Council in 2008. All of this pretty much paints a CCA Party bull's eye on his back.

Stay tuned to see what the CCA Boys do to him, and Ron Crosson, before the November elections.

In other business

Tremblay reads his rebuttal

This was a very short meeting – under an hour – but there were a couple of other matters of note.

Councilor George Tremblay reported during Councilor Comments that the re-write of the Town Comprehensive Plan is moving along. For the first time, apparently, the new Comprehensive Plan will be enforceable as if it was an ordinance. They still have a long way to go. There may be drafts ready for Planning to review in August or September. The current projection for completion of the process will be in mid to late 2015.

Tremblay also decided to challenge Rep. Donna Walsh’s public letter condemning the phony Single Taxing District “crisis” cooked up by Deputy Dan Slattery (read her letter here). Tremblay argued that, well, no matter what Donna says about the process and how it is impossible for a Single Taxing District to be enacted against Charlestown’s will, he thinks the panic is justified because the other towns in the Chariho School District keep bringing it up every few years. 

He said the challenges from the other towns "are not imaginary." As Kurt Cobain sang, "just because you're paranoid, don't mean they're not after you."

Nonetheless, prescription meds would be cheaper than sending out a scary mailer to all residents at town expense on a phony crisis.

And Mud Cove (site of the old town driving range and surrounding area) now has a new name - Pawaget Park, which is the name the Narragansetts gave to Ninigret Pond.