A Rightful Place

Amherst Town Flag at Statehouse Hall Of Flags

After three long years of design process Amherst, finally, has an official town flag in the Statehouse Hall of Flags.  Big enough so that it requires three Select Board members, the Town Manager, State Representative Ellen Story and State Senator Stan Rosenberg to hold up.  Salute!

Select Board Just Said NO

Not

The Amherst Select Board voted unanimously 4-0 (1 absent) NOT to a invoke a $6.5 million "Right Of First Refusal" for 154 acres of run-of-the-mill woodland in northeast Amherst to stop "The Retreat", a controversial 700 bed upscale student housing development proposed by a private, taxpaying, enterprise.
 
In June Amherst Town Meeting voted 98-90 to dismiss a warrant article calling for a $1.2 million appropriation to take by eminent domain only the "development rights" of the parcel.  And over the past two weeks the Planning Board voted 8-1 against the purchase while the Conservation Commission opposition was unanimous.

 

Crowd of 80-85 pack the meeting

The Select Board meeting was one of the best attended in recent memory with over a dozen project opponents voicing their concerns about noise, traffic, vandalism, and -- what they greatly fear --  the destruction of Cushman, a quaint historic village.

Speakers questioned the transparency of process since the town took a long period of time to acknowledge the 2nd $6.5 million offer between Cowls and Landmark Properties was indeed "bona fide", which started the 120-day clock ticking for the Right Of First Refusal.   

Project proponents have repeatedly cited the desperate need in this "college town" for more student housing, with current make shift solutions -- the conversion of single family homes to rooming houses -- being far more destructive to quality of life in neighborhoods town wide.

John Musante (center) Any change in contract would bring on new 120 day Right of 1st Refusal

"The Retreat" would also generate $400,000 per year in property taxes in a town where half the property is tax exempt.  In 1987 the town took by eminent domain the Cherry Hill Golf Course to stop a 134 unit high end housing project, squandering a historic $2.2 million ($4.4 million in today's dollars).

 Cowls also owns 150 acres near Cherry Hill Golf Course (in gold) that could also be developed on the same scale as The Retreat

Tonight by NOT taking this exceedingly expensive 154 acres of woodland, town officials demonstrated they have learned from history.   Finally. 

The Republican reports

Fire & Brimstone

The vitriol over stopping the "The Retreat," a housing development targeting Amherst's #1 demographic who patronize our #1 industry, is reaching a fever pitch. NIMBYs are starting to get a tad, err, twitchy.

As usual, the call has gone out to pack the Select Board public meeting Monday night to try to intimidate them into spending $6.5 million tax dollars to "protect" a quaint neighborhood.  

After all, somewhere in an alternate universe "The needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many." 

Let's hope they leave the torches and pitchforks (or phasers) at home.

 ##### 

From: llan starkweather 
Sent: Friday, July 26, 2013 2:58 PM
Subject: Fwd: Reality of the Cushman Retreat


To the GALACTIC LOG mailing list, 

On July 21st I sent my umpteenth not to be printed letter to the editor
of the Amherst Bulletin, Reality of the Cushman Retreat, enmeshed below.
It was not printed, as most of mine the last decade have been rejected
as threatening to the media establishment that controls the Valley, so I
responded this morning with the long piece also below starting with
To the local so-called Editors of the Illuminati controlled dark media
cabal, the last obstacle to true reality for valleykind:


The immediate reply from the news department was

On Jul 26, 2013, at 10:46 AM, DHG News Dept. wrote:

 Llan Starkweather: 

 If you send another vaguely threatening email (to wit, You have a short time
left to understand what your soul's mission was) I will notify the police. 

Larry Parnass 

##### 

 I could not help but respond in this fashion:

From: llan starkweather <llan3@hughes.net>

Date: July 26, 2013 2:26:06 PM EDT

To: "DHG News Dept." 

Subject: Reality of the Cushman Retreat

You have a short time before god puts you out of your nasty lying business
in allegiance with evil against humanity. Your soul's mission is your
mismanaged affair and it is more than vaguely threatened. What a poor
substitute for a being of any good will you are, little soul-shrunk Parnass.
How many lines of god's truth did you read before you started shaking your
fists at any attempt to awaken in you your real purpose in incarnation. 

I am done with you, but like Zimmerman, god isn't. And that doesn't change the
fact that you have been intentionally using your elite power to fuck me over
for a decade and would 'notify the police' for my rocking your cradle of the
dark hegemonic forces' dominant protection. Or that this valley has for very
long been denied truth and reality out of the fear in those who have usurped
all power-over through control of the fucking media. I speak for those who
cannot, or do not even know they are targeted and are being disposed of as
useless eaters by the hegemony that is now currently and finally being
revealed and dis-mantled. 

You are a loving god too. Know that. 

##### 

The Republican reports 

Executive Session: Do Not Disturb

 11:05 AM, Town Manager's office: 4 of 5 Amherst SB members attended

Perhaps the reason the state calls it "Executive Session" is because it mimics a private boardroom meeting between a CEO and a corporation's Board of Directors.  In other words, by invite only.

Although in the case of a public body like the Amherst Select Board, they still have to convene in open session (hence allowing miscreants like me to take a photo) before retreating into private conversation.   Or in this case, evicting the general public. 

The meeting was posted to start at 11:00 AM and finish by 11:59 AM (somebody must have been worried about lunch).  Actual start time was 11:06, as SB member Alisa Brewer was her usual few minutes late.  And I'm told by SB Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe the meeting adjourned at 12:39 PM.

The reason for the secret meeting was a discussion of Cowls Cushman properties (154 acres) that are currently under a Purchase& Sale agreement with Landmark Properties for $6.5 million. 

The town can either invoke the "right of first refusal" and match any legitimate offer on the table for the property, or can simply take it by eminent domain via a simple majority vote of the Select Board. 

Although the draconian use of eminent domain also requires Town Meeting authorization for monetary backing. 

The town would then be liable to pay W.D.Cowls, Inc the "highest and best use" for the property, which obviously is not that of its current condition, a tree farm.

The gift that keeps on costing

 Trailer for sale or rent...

So last night at our illustrious Select Board meeting, during a routine discussion of repackaging outstanding loans into one cheaper bond issue--refinanced with a low 2.16% interest rate--Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe asked Finance Director Sandy Pooler about the current status of the (not so) portable modular classrooms at the former Mark's Meadow Elementary School, a building owned by UMass.

"Stationary," he responded laconically.

Had Mr. Pooler been around five years ago when the classrooms were first purchased for $205,000 he probably would not now be so flippant.

Perhaps no single incident best captures the hubris of the pre-Catherine Sanderson Amherst School Committee, where the rubber stamp was routinely pressed into action, better than the portable classrooms fiasco.  Although warned on the floor of Town Meeting about declining enrollments at Mark's Meadow by longtime town meeting contrarian Nancy Gordon, the portable classrooms unanimously endorsed by the School Committee passed overwhelmingly.

In fact, at the time, School Committee Chair (and UMass School of Education Assistant Director Center for Education Policy) Andy Churchill stated:   "the School Committee needs to look hard at whether we need to add two or four modular classrooms, understanding that there is a financial component to be considered." So I guess it could have been (twice as) bad.

Just three years later, at Catherine Sanderson's bold urging, Mark's Meadow was closed and the portable classrooms, never actually put to use as classrooms serving students, lay fallow.

Now they are too expensive to move ($50,000 or more) and negotiations with UMass to purchase them seem to be going nowhere.

Yes, Ms. O'Keeffe should have banished Mr. Pooler to the woodshed for his dry sense of humor.  Or better yet, to our abandoned, useless, expensive, modular classrooms.

Is anybody listening?

I'm a journalist unafraid to put down the pen or crawl out from behind the keyboard to say what needs to be said. Loudly.

Obviously the Amherst Bulletin is not listening

On September 9 when UMass and town officials alongside District Attorney Dave Sullivan tried to soothe the party hardy behavior patterns exhibited by a hard core minority of students by handing out oatmeal cookies (I kid you not) the Gazette/Bulletin assigned veteran reporter Nick Grabbe to cover the late night "story"--what is usually referred to in journalism as a "puff piece."

Meanwhile, simultaneously in the north end of campus, the Meadow Street riot occurred. The next day the Gazette carried the cookie caper story on the front page.

Top of the morning!

McMurphy's Uptown Tavern 11/5/11 9:45 AM

Over 50 patrons were already lined up alongside McMurphy's Uptown Tavern entrance at 9:45 AM this morning awaiting a 10:00 AM opening. Yes folks, McMurphy's is a bar.

And even though the owner and manager described to our illustrious Select Board (acting as Liquor Commissioners) two weeks ago the customers they expected at this event to be "a little bit of an older crowd" they look, umm, kind of young to me.

Amherst SB: "Okay with that?"

Gang of 4 hears good news

Amherst confluence of four committees

Finance Director Sandy Pooler crunched the numbers for next year's (FY12) operating budget tonight at a joint meeting of the Finance Committee, School Committee, Select Board, and Library Trustees (affectionately known as "The gang of four"), and--in spite of the sputtering economy--the outlook was rosy as long as the spending increases keep to 2.8%, enough to provide level services.

The town finished the year with a $1.1 million surplus, which reverted to Free Cash. Total reserves (Free Cash and Stabilization) now stand at $5.6 million--not counting the cushion (around $1 million) in the Amherst Regional School's "Excess and Deficiency" savings account.

While the state is usually portrayed as the skunk in the room, an extra supplemental appropriation of $514,000 coming in for FY12 spruced up their bad guy image among town officials. The local option hotel/motel and meals tax tallied a handsome $495,000 in FY11, up $150,000 from the previous year--and with the historic Lord Jeffrey Inn coming back on line soon, that amount should go up even higher in FY12.

The property tax is of course far and away the town's main revenue source, contributing 63%, with state aid a distant second at 20%. And within that property tax, the disparity between commercial and residential continues to be an embarrassment.

In the current fiscal year residential taxpayers contribute 91% of the tax base compared to commercial/industrial at a pathetic 9%. In 2002 it was 89% residential to an anemic 11% commercial/industrial.

Half of Amherst is owned by tax exempt entities: Amherst College and UMass coming in at #1 and #2 respectively, with the town itself #3 (mostly conservation land) and Hampshire College #4. UMass makes annual Payments In Lieu Of Taxes of $325,000 for Fire and Ambulance protection, Hampshire College does not. Amherst College kicks in $100,000 every now and then.

Town Meeting will vote next month on a couple of warrant articles that could help turn around that dismal commercial/residential ratio by stimulating commercial smart growth development. A $40,000 appropriation for a townwide housing marketing study but with particular emphasis on the Gateway Corridor area for a proposed commercial mixed use project, and Form Based Zoning in the North Amherst and Atkins Corner Village Centers.

Of course Town Meeting is also one of the main factors in stonewalling development of any kind as the BANANAs (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything) can usually muster the 34% minority vote required to kill a business friendly zoning change.

The die is cast

SB:Jim Wald, Diana Stein, Alisa Brewer, Aaron Hayden, Stephanie O'Keeffe

The Rubicon has been crossed, the newspaper put to bed, as the Amherst Select Board signed the warrant for the Fall Town Meeting at approximately 12:15 PM on an otherwise bright fall Friday.
Town Meeting commences on November 7, and will not conclude until all 18 articles are acted upon.

For sure article #17, bringing Form Based Zoning to North and South Amherst village centers, will be the most controversial item, resulting in a l-o-n-g debate; as will article #5: $40,000 for a town wide "market study" of the exceedingly tight Amherst housing market, something that will be attacked as a taxpayer subsidy benefiting real estate agents and developers.

Both articles will primarily come under fire for fear they will be instrumental in producing more "student housing," the bogeyman of Amherst. The Gateway Corridor Project, a joint effort between UMass, the town and the Amherst Redevelopment Authority was the most recent project to suffer from this paranoia.

The final article (#18), an advisory to the Select Board to revive the Committee on Homelessness--terminated only last month--could also generate plenty of discussion, but since it is the last article on the warrant, perhaps members will be burned out and less likely to talk until the cows come home.

Fall Amherst Town Meeting Warrant

Living Within Our Means

Stephanie O'Keeffe ctr rt, David Ziomek acting Town Manager ctr left

Last night the Amherst Select Board--at member Alisa Brewer's urging--telegraphed a "No Override" budget for FY12, unless an emergency comes up between now and the drop-dead January 16, 2012 deadline for the Town Manager to present his budget.

I think they are starting to get it. An Override should always be a last resort for those times when an unforeseen emergency arises. Besides, with an average $1 million surplus over the past five fiscal years, they would have had a hard time selling one to the voters (even with Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe's PR skills).

Too much advocacy?

Hwei-Ling Greeney: passionate advocate for the homeless

The Committee on Homelessness put up a fiesty defense tonight against the Select Board idea of merging them into a new entity more closely resembling the current Housing Partnership Fair Housing Committee, mainly because they are too passionate about advocating for the needs of the homeless.

Hwei-Ling Greeney, Chair of the Committee on Homelessness pointed out that the Housing Partnership has been in existence for almost 30 years and did nothing for the homeless. Ms. Greeney also observed that individual Select Board members did not show up this past winter at the shelter to drop off food or play cards with guests, yet now they are making this momentous decision impacting the shelter.

When Milestone Ministries announced last week they would not renew their contract to run the homeless shelter this coming season, partly because of "micromanaging" by the Committee on Homelessness, the Select Board took direct aim at legislating the committee out of existence. Select Board Chair Stephanie O'Keeffe called Milestone's decision "A serious step backwards."

A charge Ms. Greeney said "scapegoated" her committee.

Homeless advocate Kevin Noonan said Town Meeting can be "contentious" yet nobody talks about merging them with the Select Board. He also noted that Pastor Desroches of Milestone Ministries mentioned the "micromanaging" issue almost as an aside rather than a major game changer.

The town has secured $100,000 in Community Development Block Grant funding for the upcoming season to operate the shelter and Ms Greeney said she knew of five organizations that would respond to a town Request For Proposals and be ready to open the shelter November 1.

Had any of the homeless attended tonight's meeting to observe the one hour "discussion" they probably would have felt elated that town government is fighting over them so passionately.

Kevin Noonan called the "vilification" of the Committee on Homelessness "disturbing"

Dome of Delay

Select Board meeting: first aired two days later

Now I understand the frustration our neighbors to the north feel--what we locals call "the hilltowns"--having to live without high speed wireless Internet.

The Amherst Police Station was a state of the art building at birth 20 years ago when wireless did not exist. Since then Amherst, Mass has become one of the very few municipalities in the nation to provide free wireless to the citizenry with a wide swath of the downtown covered, including Town Hall (where Select Board meetings usually occur) and the Police Station, except for the "Community Room".

About twenty years ago the state started pressuring cities and towns to make all municipal buildings handicapped accessible--especially those that host public meetings. That edict was even used as ammunition for the expensive Town Hall renovation Override 15 years ago, although it failed to convince voters both times at the ballot box. (Town Meeting eventually took out a $3 million renovation loan and former Town Manager Barry Del Castilho--not to mention his secretary who he later married--got a fancy new office.)

Wireless Internet is fast becoming the norm, like handicapped accessibility or air conditioning.But a journalist's age old prime directive remains the same: enforce the people's right to know. And in this digital era, interested people also have a right to get it instantly.
Meanwhile, 2.5 hours later in the meeting...

Douse the Nuke

Tonight the Amherst Select Board voted unanimously to extend the Nuclear Free Zone all way to our neighbor to the north by urging support for a shut down of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant next year on the original schedule forty years after the controversial plant was first commission.

Amherst added their voice to 51 other communities who also oppose the current plan by Entergy to continue generating power after receiving a 20-year license extension from federal regulators. The state legislature has voted to close the plant and the company filed a lawsuit claiming federal authority supersedes state authority.

Amherst, along with Cambridge, was on the forefront of the Nuclear Freeze movement having voted itself a "Nuclear Free Zone" in 1988 and opposed the siting of a GWEN tower (a post nuclear attack communications system) anywhere in Amherst.

Select Board chair Stephanie O'Keeffe read an email from Senator Stan Rosenberg (D-Amherst) urging support for the resolution.

Amherst's Anti-Nuke activists: Dick Stein (in red) Thomas Lindeman

The anti-nuke resolution (before amending) and other background

Capture the flag

Perhaps the Select Board should have figured it out when not a single citizen bothered to enter the "design an official Amherst flag" contest last November and only with extra PR outreach did they manage a hand full of designs.

Obviously Alisa Brewer is tiring of the typical Amherst process for getting things done. Now she can appreciate how the typical entrepreneur feels when trying to open a business in Amherst, only to get exhausted jumping through all the hoops.
The Children's Memorial Flag will fly once again at Town Hall in April under the, umm, UN flag.

Flags are powerful symbols--for good (Old Glory) or evil (Nazi swastika). This "contest" is indeed a telling symbol of 'All Things Amherst'.




For a better view of all six entries click this link