The High Cost of Storage

28 Shays Street, Amherst

Amherst police had to be called (twice) to 28 Shays Street to attempt to settle a dispute over a stored 1980 Volkswagon Rabbit. Of course if new owner Michael Ben-Chaim gets approval on Thursday night from the Zoning Board of Appeals to double occupancy from a one family to a two family operation (allowing 8 unrelated housemates) the parking lot will be hosting a lot more cars.

 According to APD logs: Assist Citizen

Michael Ben-Chaim is now demanding payment for what was supposed to be a favor in return.  I explained this was a civil situation and it does not look favorable on Mr. Ben-Chaim as he was not allowing car to be returned.  Talked to the Reporting Party and explained to him how to proceed with the civil process.  Ben-Chaim also let it be known he was upset the neighborhood was seeking a stop order against him for building and RP confirmed Ben-Chaim was most likely looking to get money to fight the proceedings.

Careful What You Wish For

 28 Shays Street, Amherst

It will be interesting to see how neighbors here in South Amherst react to the request coming before the Zoning Board of Appeals to expand a house the former owner referred to as a "shack" from one family (four occupants max) all the way to three family (dozen occupants).

Dave Keenan purchased the humble abode at 28 Shays Street in 1994 for $2,500 but with back taxes owed($8,000)  to the town and DEP ordered clean up (backed by $30,000 in fines) required because of a leaky oil storage tank.  Dave never did add much in the way of window dressing, so neighbors were constantly complaining to the town about the general ramshackle appearance.

Finally with back taxes and legal fees owed topping $60,000 the town tried to foreclose and have building inspectors check out whether the house was even habitable.  Mr Keenan telegraphed that he would not allow entry without a fight and a Ruby Ridge was narrowly avoided.

Keenan came up with the money owed to the town via a friend, Eric Burt, who must have been savvy enough to have the house held as collateral.  Keenan never paid him back, and as a result lost the house.  Last September Mr. Burt sold it for $159,800 to Michael Ben-Chaim, who now wishes to triple the occupancy.

Do good things come in threes?  Perhaps...certainly for the new owner.

Amherst Town Meeting commences

The only surprise at tonight's Town Meeting kick off was the appearance by irascible Dave Keenan who told the venerable Gazette last week he would resign his seat after being arrested by APD for assault with a dangerous weapon and malicious destruction of property.

Perhaps a stern judge sentenced him to serve out his Town Meeting term, certainly a fate worse than jail (but not as bad as a bullet to the head).

Activism gone too far

Dave Keenan doing his thing

All was relatively quiet in the People's Republic this week as all the Bad Boy partiers must have gone home to the Boston area to attend Easter sunrise services; either that or they are resting up for the Hobart Hoedown 2011.

Thus no winner for the "Party House of the Weekend" or at least nothing that rises to the level of a (dubious) award winning event. Only two total $300 noise tickets issued to college aged individuals, one at 260 Grantwood Drive and one at 76 Taylor Street.

But the big story of the week is my friend and fellow townie Dave Keenan, who has been in the news of late for opposing the solar farm out at the old landfill (not to mention costing the town a six-figure sum in revenues for disposing of contaminated soil that could have help regrade the landfill's surface), getting arrested on Friday (early evening) for allegedly "breaking and entering in the nighttime for felony, destruction of property over $250, malicious assault with dangerous weapon on a person over age 60." Yikes!

Say it isn't so Dave...

1720 South East Street: Scene of the alleged crime

Solar powered Electric Chair?

This detonation of a backpack nuke at last night's Select Board meeting--publicly suggesting Amherst will be an "accomplice in a capital crime"--was obviated a couple hours later, when reading from a prepared statement during his Town Manger's report, John Musante informs the Select Board he's given up on using DEP approved contaminated soil to regrade the old unlined landfill.

Still, you gotta love Mr. Boothroyd's borrowing from Steve Jobs the "one last thing" intro before dropping the bombshell.



End result? The town losses $250,000 in disposal fees paid in work/equipment barter from the major contractor rebuilding Atkins Corner, who will now have to pay cash to another disposal facility at a greater rate per ton for the 6,000 ton load.

And the town will have to rely on street sweepings and catch basin crud to try to make up the difference for the regrading but will probably have to bring in clean fill at additional cost in labor and cash. All in all, a lose-lose scenario.

Twenty years ago Mr. Keenan enhanced his "fiscal conservative" image by volunteering to clean up pigeon poop from the Town Hall attic after Town Manager Barry Del Castilho (worried about the health of his secretary, who later became his wife) was preparing to spend over $100,000 to have a hazardous waste disposal company clean it up.

And a couple weeks ago Mr. Keenan blew the whistle to DEP about 20-30 barrels of potentially hazardous waste (paint from UMass) that was buried somewhere in the landfill over 25 years ago by town DPW workers.

But if everyone is also so concerned about the integrity of the landfill cap, then why try to force the town into cracking it open to dig for those 20 or 30 needles in a haystack?

Solar Flare

Atkins construction soil

John Boothroyd and Dave Keenan, two outspoken critics of the town's attempt to recast the old unlined landfill into a sea of shiny solar panels took their battle directly to the Select Board at the unscripted 6:30 PM "Question Period" tonight, focusing on the potential health hazard of pesticide laced soil approved by the DEP as partial fill to repair sagging areas of the landfill cap due to settling common after 20 years of decomposition.

John Musante, during his "Town Manager's Report", told the Select Board the contaminated soil controversy had created "a lot of anxiety" and become a "distraction."

The regrading of the landfill will occur regardless of the solar array project and since the use of lead arsenate soil was a relatively minor part of the overall work, he directed DPW chief Guilford Mooring to abandon the idea of using 6,000 tons of tainted soil from the Atkins Corner Road project, although he praised Mr Mooring for "trying to be entrepreneurial".

Musante by no means backed down on the ambitious project to construct a 4.75 megawatt solar farm on the landfill that could provide the town with a million dollars per year in combined electricity savings and property tax revenues.

Dark clouds on the Solar Farm horizon?

DEP requires Amherst to regrade undulations at old landfill

Dave Keenan, a long-time thorn in town officials side, although once a town official himself, is baaaaaack.

Now he's lobbing a stink bomb into the middle of Amherst public officials picnic over turning our old abandoned landfill into a cash cow solar array farm that will produce enough renewable energy to supply all municipal needs, saving the town almost $1 million per year in electricity costs, and pay up to a couple hundred thousand dollars annually in property taxes.

Government tax incentives have stimulated these sunny public/private partnerships springing up nationwide like weeds after a summer rain. And it's not as though old landfills are good for much else.

Mr Keenan blew the whistle to his old acquaintances at the Department of Environmental Protection claiming three retired DPW workers told him about 20-30 barrels of hazardous wastes--allegedly lead based paint from UMass-- they were ordered to bury back in the 1980s.

While I cannot corroborate that particular story, I can verify first hand that hazardous materials were indeed tossed into the smelly pit. Yes, I admit it; 50 years ago my dad and I threw old paint, solvents, dirty motor oil, leftover cleaning products, insecticides, fertilizers, outdated medicines, etc. As did most of the citizens of bucolic Amherst.

To say there are hazardous wastes buried in the old landfill is like declaring there's bear dung in the woods of Maine. That's why the town spent a considerable amount to cap the site with an impermeable protective cover: to keep water from mixing with the dangerous contents and forming a hazardous cocktail that could could migrate downstream. Monitoring sites were also installed to test for that scenario and a system to handle methane gas.

But after 20 Years of fermentation the contents down under have settled causing the cap to sag in spots, allowing pools of water to form on the surface. The DEP ordered the town to fill in the depressions and regrade the site to its original aircraft carrier flatness--all without disturbing the cap of course. As you can imagine, that is a tad expensive.

Fortunately the town is in the middle of a road construction boom. The Atkins corner project, with two roundabouts coming soon, has already generated massive amounts of dirt. Only one slight problem: 6,000 tons of it is contaminated with lead arsenate, a common insecticide used on apples orchards between 1892 and the early 1970s when it was banned by the EPA.



The contractor can either spend a fortune hauling the contaminated soil to a special handling facility or bring it to the old landfill to use as fill for DEP required site remediation. Everybody saves a ton of money. The DEP approved the idea, but will require a three foot layer of non-polluted soil to cover the contaminated soil and numerous other safety precautions.

But every cloud does indeed have a silver lining. If a project--like the Bluewave Captital Solar panel farm on the old landfill--is "part of a site remediation or restoration under a Mass/DEP enforcement action/order" it is eligible for "fast track status" when negotiating the local permitting process.

And while the long-term contract with Bluewave will have to be approved by town meeting it will only require a simple majority vote, unlike a zoning change that requires two thirds.

Who says money doesn't fall from the sky? Now it will--whenever the sun is shining.



Christmas '07: After the town took Dave Keenan's humble abode for $50,000 in back taxes he camped out in his former front yard. DEP fines for ten years procrastination cleaning up an oil spill also amounted to $30,000. Mr. Keenan eventually repaid Amherst over $63,000 in back taxes and legal fees.

Business West profiles the Amherst Solar farm