$60,000 town/gown consultant contract up for grabs
Hear ye, hear ye: The joint UMass town of Amherst Request For Proposals, a consultant contract worth $60,000, has just hit the Internet.
The large Town Gown Steering (super) Committee -- made up of heavy hitters from both UMass and the town, hashed out the legal contract over four meetings.
The cost of the consultant is also shared 50/50 by the two superpowers, although the University handled all the final edits and legal issues that go along with issuing a 15 page public document.
The main focus for the consultant will be double edged problems, probably endemic to "college towns": housing and economic development.
Two recent town sponsored housing studies have concluded the lack of student housing drives up prices making it difficult for middle income families -- and impossible for low income families -- to find shelter.
Plus Amherst has an overwhelmingly skewed tax base, as the housing market represents 90% of the total tax base and the commercial sector a pitiful 10%.
With the recent loss of 204 affordable units at Rolling Green Apartment complex the town has now fallen below the magic 10% threshold for Subsidized Housing Inventory and could be (within the next year) subject to a Chapter 40B mega development.
11 comments:
"The main focus for the consultant will be double edged problems, probably endemic to "college towns": housing and economic development."
Kind of odd. The town wants neither housing for the poor nor the students, and frowns on any economic development whatsoever. $60k to hit a wall in Amherst? All those years of ignoring reality are about to bite them in the ass if they don't do something to protect their backyard.
Yep. The BIG problem is going to be implementing the consultant's recommendations.
This is yet another example of hire the consultant to tell us what we know, but we can hide behind the consultant when it comes to action. Instead of seeing the problem and acting, Amherst spends money hiring someone to waste time finding out what is already known, then blames them for the inaction in the end. Amherst is a well oiled machine. No not that kind of machine. It's more like the Rube Goldberg kind where incredible effort is put into doing nothing.
Amherst still seems to live by Lord Jeff's motto "any other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execrable Race serves us well".
I vote for the Mega Development. Go Mega Development. It is what Amherst's inaction so richly deserves.
Say it with me Amherst:
MEGA DEVELOPMENT
MEGA DEVELOPMENT
MEGA DEVELOPMENT
Because actions (or rather actions to prevent any progress) have consequences
Low income families get Section 8 vouchers and have no problem finding housing in Amherst -- it's the middle income families who aren't able to do so.
This consultant would have a very simple answer -- tell people that it's 2014 and not 1974 and that they can't stay "stuck in the '70's" anymore.
Not unless they want to go into the kind of economic vortex that places like Ware (stuck in the 1950's) have.
I would hope the winning candidate has decent PR skills to sell, sell, sell that idea.
I feel sorry for whoever wins that contract as he/she will work very hard only to tell the town what they already know and don't want to hear. Amherst IS living in the seventies as the last person said. Simply drive through downtown and you'll see.
Like a stopped watch, the angriest, most demented people on this blog are right occasionally.
This is it.
It's difficult to see how this consultant is going to accomplish anything. This is the movie "Groundhog's Day", Amherst-style.
Despite all these terrible things, Amherst is one of the best towns in Massachusetts. Wonder why?
"Best towns" as defined byWHOM?
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