Transparency and the Planning Commission

Lack of documents makes it difficult to judge the merits of the Planning Commission's proposed advisory to the Town Council on Gentz's proposed "evolutionary adjustments" to state affordable housing law.

By Linda Felaco

No documents were provided—and there’s still no sign of any on Clerkbase—for last night’s Planning Commission meeting to develop an advisory opinion on the proposed changes to the state’s affordable housing legislation. Given the importance of the issue, not just for Charlestown but the entire state, the absence of documents tends to diminish one’s faith in transparency. Not to mention it made it really hard to follow along as they haggled their way through their excruciating line-by-line edits of the document that they refused to post for public examination. Why oh why can’t they use Google Docs rather than sitting there marking up pieces of paper that no one in the audience can see. It’s clearly not for lack of equipment; Tom Ferrio made a very professional PowerPoint presentation at the last Town Council meeting.

But I digress.

Thankfully, no finger-drumming this time, at least. It appears Will Collette was right about it being George Tremblay. Tremblay must have read Will’s piece and took his complaint to heart, because he sat there with his arms crossed through much of the meeting.

The meeting started off with a discussion of the white paper Planning Commissioner Ruth Platner ghostwrote for Town Council President Tom Gentz. Platner and Gentz took great pains to maintain the fiction that Gentz actually wrote it. Ruth modestly stated, “I can’t explain it,” and deferred to Tom, who asked, “What do you want me to explain, what I wrote in the white paper?”

Gentz started off by stating that Charlestown is the only town in all the cities and towns of Rhode Island—at which point he turned to Town Planner Ashley Hahn Morris for confirmation of the number of cities and towns in RI (39, in case you weren’t sure)—that has an affordable housing bond. Yay, us! Assuming, of course, that this is even true. Lack of documents sort of detracts from the listener’s ability to check sources.

But then Gentz once again betrayed his lack of familiarity with “his” writing by losing his place at one point in the discussion and appearing not to know what the paper actually said—Mary even jumped in at this point to hand him a copy, although it was sitting right there in front of him—and flat-out admitting that he was “having trouble reading his own white paper.”

So as it turns out, just in the time since Gentz first proposed his “evolutionary adjustments” to the state affordable housing law at the November Town Council meeting, the goalposts have already shifted. Now the new magic number that makes a house “affordable” to anyone whose income is up to 120% of area median income (AMI) is $366,000. Ruth opined that “the nicest houses in my neighborhood are at that price, and they’re fancy houses.” Then she hastened to add (to chuckling all around), “Not mine!”

Turns out Tom Ferrio’s estimate of ~900 existing affordable houses in town was too low! Now the magic numbers are:

• 2971 properties assessed below $366,000, which is affordable for people earning 120% of AMI,
• 2210 properties assessed below $334,000, which is affordable for people earning 100% of AMI, and
• 1219 properties assessed below $247,000, which is affordable to people earning 80% of AMI.

(And yet these godforsaken builders keep harassing us with these applications for comp permits, was the unspoken subtext.)

Again, without documentation it’s not clear where these numbers came from or whether they’re based on anything other than Ruth and Cliff’s fevered dreams of Charlestown population control.

A discussion then ensued about the availability of affordable housing in various cities and towns around the state in which Gentz used the “French-Canadian” pronunciation of Woonsocket. You know what I mean: “WoonsockET,” with the accent on the final syllable. I had to rewind to make sure I’d actually heard him right.

Then they turned from the white paper to the text of the advisory to the town council. A discussion ensued about whether to include comments and background on the way they arrived at the various points in the document. Ruth made the rather astonishing assertion that “I don’t think this council would read it all.” Then again, why should I be astonished? She writes ordinances with no expectation of them ever being used; why not write advisories in order for them not to be read?

Make it simple for Deputy Dan!

At one of the rare points when the issue of the needs of actual people was raised, Gentz declared that “I approved two good rental projects—100% affordable rental projects in growth areas—so I cannot be challenged on the fact that I’m trying to change social policy because for the first time this town has actually moved social policy forward.” He then steered the discussion back toward his big bugaboo, which is that “increased density in a rural area is incorrect public policy.”

At various points, the issue was raised of who the text was addressed to, the public or the Town Council. Ruth felt that it was very important to dumb things down for us unenlightened citizens. Town Council President Tom Gentz, on the other hand, felt that even for the town council, a 4^th-grade reading level was a good goal to shoot for.

At one point they were haggling over some minute point and who it should be attributed to and Ruth said not to worry, she’d instruct Mary to delete 18 minutes of tape. Then Tremblay made a McCarthy reference. Good to know our planning commissioners have such excellent role models.

And they all had themselves a good belly laugh over renters and how they’d like to be able to just pick up the phone any time the sink’s backed up and make someone else deal with it. Hardy har har. I mean, even Faith LaBossiere acknowledges the need for more rentals in this town, for cryin’ out loud. As near as I can figure, the Planning Commission thinks rentals are bad because they mean greater density. Either you live in a freestanding single-family home, or you live in another town, seems to be the attitude. We here in Charlestown are landed gentry! We don’t need no steenking rentals!

On that note, Gordon Foer made the eminently sensible suggestion that the Planning Commission should maybe find out what people’s housing needs actually are. Of course, this would’ve been good information for the PC to have before eviscerating affordable housing.

There was also much discussion of the environmental impact of affordable housing. Funny, I thought that was what the Conservation Commission was for. As Will has pointed out, the only real authority the PC has under the town charter is over property lines. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for protecting the environment, but not at the expense of people’s needs. Call me crazy, but I’m more concerned about habitat for people than for grasshopper sparrows.

They were also at great pains to include the phrase “egregious disregard for residents” in the text. You’d think someone was trying to build a big-box store next to someone’s house or something. Apparently, buying property in this town gives you some sort of god-given right not to have lower-income people move in next door. Someone should have told my neighbors that before I moved in.

Three-plus hours, and they never even got to the parking or shrubbery. And there I had a tab open with the video of the knights who say ni cued to start it up at the appropriate point. Though on the plus side, we’ll be spared from these two particularly flagrant instances of overregulation and PC meddling in issues beyond its legal purview for at least another month.