Zoning Compromise

Michael Ben-Chaim (standing) 8 opposition neighbors (rear)

My late journo mentor Howard Ziff once told Amherst Town Meeting that a "good compromise" is one where neither side walks away perfectly happy, and our Zoning Board of Appeals appears to have adopted that philosophy with their painfully long discussion of 28 Shays Street, a public hearing that took three meetings to, finally, conclude.

ZBA: Hilda Greenbaum, Barbara Ford, Eric Beal, Building Commish Rob Morra

And for new owner Michael Ben-Chaim, 3rd time was the charm...sort of.  The ZBA unanimoulsy approved, over neighborhood objection, the expansion of the 50+ year old house built from a Sears mailorder kit the right to expand from a one-family to a two-family dwelling where normally each "family" could possibly be four unrelated adults.

And of course the major concern of neighbors are those unrelated adults = "students."

Originally Mr. Ben-Chaim, a teacher by trade, wished to expand to a three family dwelling.  Yes, that may have been salesmanship on his part, expecting the board would compromise at two.  But the most interesting condition of the compromise requires Mr. Ben-Chaim be one of the families, and if he sells the house, the buyer must live there or the house reverts back to a one family unit.

28 Shay Street. Baird House hidden behind screen of evergreens, with more coming

As any of you who have followed my Party House of the Weekend series knows, the winners are always owned by absentee landlords.  I grew up in a large house on High Street where my mother was forced to rent to students to make ends meet.  And we never had a problem with noise, vandalism, or drunken revelry. Hell hath no fury like an angry Irish mother.

The idea of creating a condition for "owner occupied" as part of the approval seems to have originated with the Amherst Historical Commission.  Not that the deteriorating house at 28 Shays is historically significant.  The immediate neighbor, however, most certianly is and that abode at 38 Shays Street is characterized as"the most historically significant house in town."

No, not the Dickinson Homestead--although it is also closely associated with Amherst College:  The  Baird House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for noted Amherst College professor Theodore Baird.

And yes, maybe I'll forgive the Historical Commission for that slight to Miss Emily, because the Baird House is most certainly the most important architectual house in Amherst.

And the Historical Commission and Design Review Board went out of their way to ensure the Baird House is not impacted in any significant manner by the new renovations, recommending tree plantings for additional screenage, downcast lighting, and locating the tenant parking spaces as far away from the Baird House as possible.

The Zoning Board took their advice, incorporating those conditions into their order of approval.

Now if only the ZBA would start making that "owner occupied"  provision mandatory in all future single family conversions Amherst would be better by far for it.

And in this particular case, safe bet the neighbors will be watching to ensure the provision is enforced.

ZBA Petition Shays St

Brighter Downtown

New flowers for town center

A generation or two before the  permaculture movement became a media darling, the old fashioned Amherst Garden Club has been doing its horticultural thing, including maintaining the planters in town center.

And if gardens strike your fancy, the Amherst Historical Society is sponsoring a "garden tour" today from 9:30 AM until 4:00 PM.

Arbor Arousal

Amherst Public Shade Tree Committee Chair Hope Crolius, committee member Bob Irwin 

In their first meeting since the Amherst Public Shade Tree Committee became a stand alone entity, after 40 years toiling as a subcommittee of the Conservation Commission, Chair Hope Crolius came out swinging, questioning the rubber stamp routine of Tree Warden Alan Snow and the tactics of Town Manager John Musante who recently summoned her to a private meeting to address the "tone" of her committee.

Crolius rattled off a recent list of occasions where the Tree Warden ignored the tree affirming vote of the Shade Tree Committee, including Atkins Corner clearcutting, beautiful black walnuts in front of Hampshire College (that were later spared because of an easement trade by the college to the town) and most recently a huge, healthy 50 year old spruce on Railroad Street he allowed a housing management company that specializes in student rentals to whack for the convenience of a new driveway.

 Alan Snow, volunteer Tree Warden and professional DPW manager

Crolius observed that for the previous five years, when not employed by the town, Snow was an outsider who put the trees first; but now that he's wearing a different hat--Division Director, Tree and Grounds Amherst DPW--he is "no longer one of us."

A previous Town Manager appointed Snow to his unpaid position as Tree Warden and of course the current Town Manager is the boss of DPW director Guilford Mooring who oversees Snow. 

In a closed door meeting with Town Manager Musante, set up by Conservation Director Dave Ziomek (son of former Tree Warden Stan Ziomek) Crolius described a public relations cheerleading indoctrination session where he strongly suggested the committee "keep it positive," and consider "the big picture."

Musante boasted the town has big things to accomplish, thus the committee should not focus on doing battle for individual trees at UMass or the town owned Hawthorne sugar maples or the stately, rarely seen Camperdown Elm owned by Amherst College.

Ancient but healthy Camperdown Elm Amherst College Pratt Field

Committee member Nonny Burack responded to Crolius's report saying, "I'm very uncomfortable with the Town Manager's comments" and that they amounted to "almost a threat." She also pointed out "developers are going to laugh at you if you're overly positive."

The Public Shade Tree Committee plans to invite Town Manager Musante to attend one of their upcoming open public meetings. Apparently, being summoned to the woodshed works both ways.

Shutesbury Smack Down

The Appeals Court, as expected, did not overturn Superior Court Judge Mary-Lou Rup's decision and they did not even bother to rule on the votes of Shoshana Holzberg-Pill and her brother Jacob Holzberg-Pill (thrown out by Judge Rup) because upholding the voting rights of Richard and Joan Paczkowski made the matter of the Pills votes moot.

The Shutesbury Board of Registrars had allowed all four contested votes (Pills and Paczkowkis) to count but threw out the vote of Christopher Buck (originally allowed by the Town Clerk) bringing the vote total to a 522-522 tie, measure fails.

A pro library contingent of ten voters appealed the decision of the Board of Registrars tying to get the "no" votes of the Paczkowskis thrown out, but instead Superior Court Judge Mary-Lou Rup upheld their votes and went even further, throwing out the Pill "yes" votes.

Thus with this Appeals Court ruling today, the new Shutesbury library $1.4 million override vote now-and-forever stands at 522-520, ballot question fails.

And because the deadline to accept a state grant of $2.1 million--requiring the $1.4 million in town matching funds--expires June 30, the issue that refused to die is now dead, buried with a big ol' building sited squarely on top (just not a new library).

Appeals Court Decision

Pool Delay (announcement delayed)

Deep end of the pool still not done 11:15 AM Thurdsday 

4:55 PM Breaking News (shocked, shocked I say).  Town Manager announces pool will not be open Saturday. 

 ####

Original Post:  High Noon:

So if I had to guess (and I do since town officials still refuse to comment) I would say we will be lucky if the War Memorial Pool is open for July 4 festivities.

Perhaps Town Manager John Musante was too busy with his gig as chair of the PVTA advisory board to pay attention to this hometown matter, but the first rule of public relations is to address bad news as quickly as possible and be perfectly clear and honest with your customers, errr, constituents.

New water pump (still needs to be hardwired)

Industrial strength filter

Pool Pain

War Memorial Pool Wednesday morning 11:00 AM

For the second time now I'm predicting (based on "no comment" comments from town officials, and a little construction knowledge) Amherst will postpone the long awaited opening of the centrally located War Memorial Pool, yet again.

Obviously town officials don't live by the private sector credo, "underpromise and overdeliver." Last Spring LSSE announced the pool would open on June 23rd, in time for summer swim lessons and advertised that overly ambitious date in their quarterly brochure mailed to most of Amherst.

The Town Manager announced last week the opening would be delayed, however, until June 30, using the "weather-related" excuse fine tuned over twenty five years of seasonal losses at the municipal golf course.

Recently it did rain...less than an inch. And it was pretty hot for two or three days. Which, all in all, sounds a lot like typical  New England summer weather to me.

I'm told we will have official comment "soon."

Gray area is felt underlay, blue area new liner over it

Going to the Dogs

Petco

The Happy Valley pet care market is about to heat up with Petco opening at the Stop and Shop stripmall on the Hadley/Amherst line in the former location of the extinct Blockbuster.  The animal supply retailer has over 1,000 locations nationwide and a strong web presence with over one million "likes" on Facebook.

While good news for folks with pets, not so good news for Dave's Soda and Pet City less than a mile down the road and only a half dozen total locations in the Valley. Of course with pets, price is not the only consideration--customer service also plays a b-i-g role.

And Dave Ratner runs a mission oriented business deeply involved with the community (people and pets), so they should be able to handle the competition.