Charlestown year in review

Charlestown’s Top Ten Stories of 2013

By Will Collette

As the CCA Party tightened its grip on Charlestown town government for its fifth year in a row, that meant more interesting things for the writers of Progressive Charlestown to cover. That's been great for our readership numbers. 

Now in the middle of its third term controlling the Town, the CCA Party leaders have become increasingly daring in promoting their special interest agenda that favors Charlestown’s landed gentry and non-residents over the vast majority of residents who have families and work for a living.

As we’ve documented, Charlestown has become an openly “pay to play” town. 

Don’t expect any meaningful help from town government unless you are a CCA Party friend and ally, and most importantly, a CCA Party campaign donor.

On the flip side, if you are a CCA Party donor or loyal supporter, you can expect the CCA Party Town Council majority to reward you handsomely, whether it’s with a $2 million bailout, a coveted political patronage position, or opposition to things that annoy you, such as human activity in Ninigret Park or shell-fishing in Ninigret Pond.

Want the town to muster volunteers to clean up your property? Want a bike path to the beach? Want an enemy punished? Just drop your check, made out to the CCA, in the mail.

Charlestown’s CCA leaders have also attempted to clamp down on transparency by holding secret votes during Council meetings and violating the state open records law.

I could go on but let’s let the stories speak for themselves as we look at Charlestown’s Top Stories for 2013...

1. Whalerock wind turbine proposal

Not counting legal expenses, all it took was $2.1 million

Hardly anyone in town wanted to see Larry LeBlanc build two 400+ foot turbines on the Charlestown moraine. Not even Larry LeBlanc. What Larry LeBlanc wanted was for the town to redeem what he considered to be a long-overdue promise by the town to buy his 81 acres.

Charlestown’s #1 story of 2013 was a truly remarkable adventure, full of twists and turns, a tale of the town’s convoluted journey to essentially do what everyone wanted (and which I had proposed more than two years ago).

Instead of negotiating a deal in good faith, the CCA Town Council majority, spurred on by what became an anti-science cult of anonymous abutters, spent a whole lot of money and caused deep rifts in the town. Using fake science and questionable tactics, the battle over the Whalerock project ended in a town buy-out.

2. Pay to Play

The Whalerock controversy was but one of several instances reported in Progressive Charlestown of the ruling CCA Party’s decision to put a “For Sale” sign in front of Town Hall. Early on in their new term, the CCA Party Town Councilors made it clear that they would fight for those causes and interests that were important to their major donors and supporters – whether it was fighting against an expanded Rhythm and Roots event or a new concert series by promoter Frank J. Russo or expanded aquaculture shell-fishing in our coastal ponds.

In addition to advocating for causes that benefited CCA Party supporters, there were major CCA patronage appointments to key town positions. Some examples: leader of the Whalerock anonymous abutters and losing 2012 CCA Town Council candidate Ron Areglado was appointed to the Chariho School Committee, as was his Ill Wind colleague Donna Chambers. 

You can also get what you want by being 
a CCA attack puppet

Sachem Passage Association leader and losing 2012 CCA candidate for Planning Commission Peter Herstein was appointed…wait for it…to the Planning Commission.

CCA Party pundit Mike Chambers was appointed to the Zoning Board of Review after Town Council President Boss Tom Gentz (CCA) blacklisted the re-appointment of William Meyers to the ZBR. Meyers had been publicly attacked by Ron Areglado (whose rules of civility only apply to others), the first such blacklisting of a reappointment in five years. That was the vacancy filled by Mike Chambers. 

Waiting in the wings for another patronage appointment to the ZBR is losing 2010 CCA candidate for Council Cliff Vanover.

And who is it who pays to play? Once all the 2012 campaign finance reports were in, we reported that around 60% of the CCA’s huge campaign war chest came from non-residents who had interests in such things as blocking a homestead tax credit for full-time residents or curtailing activity in Ninigret Park or spending public tax dollars to buy adjacent properties to prevent land uses the neighbors opposed. And that trend is continuing into the 2014 campaign cycle.

3. Copar Quarries

The Connecticut-based Copar Quarries seemed to emerge from thin air to become one of our area’s worst air polluters, not to mention the myriad of other problems including noise and nuisance, water pollution and illegal dumping, dozens of worker safety violations and road hazards. 

During the past year, Progressive Charlestown documented just how bad this company is – so bad that town officials in Westerly, Charlestown and Richmond have been made to look foolish, incompetent or perhaps even corrupt.

Charlestown started off the year by making wild promises of coming to the rescue, but in the end, the best they could do was send a letter to the Attorney General asking him to look into it, and telling neighbors there was nothing they could do. As for that letter to the AG, it nearly provoked a war with Westerly because all the letter did was blame them for the Copar mess. Not that Westerly didn’t deserve major criticism, but Charlestown has done nothing substantive.

I wonder if Charlestown’s reaction would be different if the neighbors were wealthy CCA donors and supporters. You be the judge.

4. The never-ending war with the Narragansett Indian Tribe

Given the close kinship between the CCA Party and the group formerly known as the RI Statewide Coalition (RISC), it’s no surprise that the CCA carries on the attacks on the Tribe that were RISC’s Raison d'être. Charlestown employs controversial former East Providence Mayor Joe Larisa as its Special Counsel to fight the Tribe and pays him a retainer of $24,600 a year.

Larisa’s big issue for 2013 was trying to prevent the transfer of the former Providence Boys and Girls Club Camp Davis property to the Tribe to fulfill the terms of a land swap. Those efforts have been deeply hush-hush, but the fact is that the land transfer has been stalled.

Larisa has also read internet news reports for the town to make sure Congress does nothing to undo the Carcieri v. Salazar decision that has taken sovereignty rights from over 500 tribes across the country. 

He has also counseled the town on smaller matters, such as how much and what kind of shrubbery the Tribe needed to plant around its new Long House. Indeed, the whole long flap between the Tribe and Charlestown over their new tribal museum was an under-the-radar theatre of the absurd (click here to read an e-mail thread that illustrates what I mean).

5. Stankiewicz hired as new Town Administrator

Mark Stankiewicz was hired by the Town Council early in the year. He seemed like a good pick – like so many town managers, he had worked at, and been forced out of, quite a number of other similar jobs, usually over matters of principle.

He came in with a good sense of humor and what seemed to be a determination to do good. But I must admit to being disappointed. Two actions were particularly disturbing – one was his imposition of a virtual stone wall on what used to be public records. The second was his insensitive response to Charlestown residents’ problems with the Copar Quarry. His difficulty in effectively communicating the town’s message hasn’t helped either (click here and here for examples)

It seems pretty clear that Stankiewicz is trying very hard to follow the instructions he has been given by the CCA Party Council majority (see “Pay to Play,” above) and is perhaps tired of always getting forced to resign (click here and here) which is a common occupational hazard for many town managers. It’s a tough spot to be in, getting the Charlestown gig after being out of work for months.

6. Charlestown’s Stone Wall

The CCA Party says all the right things when it comes to transparency and good government. 

But when it comes to practicing good government, that’s another story. When it comes to transparency in government, the CCA is the Party of Darkness. 

Among the many stories over the past year, Councilor Deputy Dan Slattery (CCA) and his “Australian Ballot” stands out.

Slattery proposed the Town Council select its replacement appointee for a Chariho School Committee vacancy among three applicants by secret ballot during the Council meeting. He called it an “Australian Ballot.” Through this process, the Council ended up appointing the spectacularly unqualified but reliable CCA Party loyalist Donna Chambers to fill the position.

Deb Carney takes down
Slattery - again

The problem is the Town Council can’t hold secret ballots, particularly at open Council meetings. Under state laws, the Council must disclose even the votes it takes during closed door Executive Sessions. Former Town Council President Deb Carney filed a complaint with the Attorney General and the AG’s office nixed Slattery’s Kangaroo gambit. Charlestown became a state laughingstock again.

The town also decided that court records it has on cases where the town is a party are no longer public records. Town Administrator Mark Stankiewicz claimed Charlestown no longer had possession of these records; only our Town Solicitor Peter Ruggiero had the records and he claimed he was not covered by the state open records law. I filed a complaint with the Attorney General and the AG ruled that the town’s stone wall tactics were totally illegal and that our Town Solicitor, who should have known better, is covered under the law.

Click here for the details of the irregularities in the way the town hired its special Counsel for the Whalerock case and how that lawyer, with the town’s tacit permission, tried to cover-up what he did with your money.

7. Bugs

It was a tough year for climate change deniers, including anti-wind power NIMBYs like the Ill Winders and Tina Jackson. Aside from the terrible damage to our coastline from intensified storms, and worsened summer ozone pollution, we’ve also been inundated with bugs. 

Whether it’s higher tick populations (and increased rates of Lyme Disease), mosquitoes bringing West Nile, Eastern Equine Encephalitis and other viruses, or beetles, wasps and winter moths killing our woodlands, one of the tangible effects of climate change on Charlestown has been a sharp up-tick in very annoying insects. Makes you appreciate the town’s Mosquito Abatement Commission a lot more.

8. Renewed attacks on affordable housing

It seems like every fall since CCA Party leader Tom Gentz took took control of Charlestown's Town Council three years ago, Party stalwarts gear up for an annual attack on the state’s affordable housing law. The CCA seems to believe that they are so smart and Charlestown is so special we should be exempt from the standards the rest of the state must follow. And Gentz and his cohorts will keep going to the State House until they convince the General Assembly of that fundamental fact.

Meanwhile, Charlestown remains one of the very worst among RI’s 39 cities and towns, worse than towns a lot smaller and more rural (e.g. Block Island) who have found that having more affordable housing is good for their communities.

But the CCA Party insists that affordable housing is really a problem and not a solution. It continues to tout Councilor George Tremblay’s bogus research and promotes Planning Commissar Ruth Platner’s repugnant theory that children are parasites, so families with school-age children should be discouraged from settling in Charlestown.

Tremblay, Gentz and the other CCA town leaders want Charlestown’s “distressed properties," ones where the owners have lost so much equity that they are underwater, or face foreclosure, to be counted as “affordable housing.” That idea is so wrong on so many levels – click here for Rep. Donna Walsh’s explanation of the difference.

Then there are the obnoxious attitudes toward low-income residents frequently voiced by Town Councilors Tremblay and Dan Slattery. This is one Top Ten story I am sick of reporting.

9. Attacks on small business

Speaking of being sick of reporting stories, our #9 story for 2013 are the CCA Party’s continued efforts to drive town businesses out of town and prevent new businesses from moving in. 

Witness the recent enactment by the Council majority to micromanage shrubbery and parking at town businesses as prime examples. Charlestown has lost several small businesses but I guess there’s some good news – we did get two new gun dealers.

10. Chariho regional school system

How we educate children is a mark of how much a community cares about its future. The three Chariho towns of Charlestown, Richmond and Hopkinton seem to agree on nothing except they each want to pay as little as possible to educate Chariho students while reserving the right to complain and nitpick. 

CCA political appointees Areglado and Chambers
- pushing their own agendas

Three times, the Chariho budget went to the voters at a figure at or less than last year’s budget. Three times, the voters of Hopkinton and Richmond voted “NO” in such large numbers that they overwhelmed Charlestown’s plurality in favor of the budget. So the system runs on the equivalent of a continuing resolution, called “maintenance of effort.”

Two elected Charlestown school committee members resigned and two CCA Party patronage appointees – Ron Areglado and Donna Chambers – took their place. Neither of them were prominent when Chariho needed them during the budget balloting.

However, Chambers has been far from silent  supporting the siphoning off of Chariho funding for charter schools, while Ron Areglado has been crusading for a school committee rule change that would impose a “civility” standard on committee members that he himself has been unwilling to follow in his own conduct.

Since Hopkinton, but particularly Richmond, want some changes to the way Chariho is funded, we end the year on the brink of war among the towns led by our own stalwart Deputy Dan Slattery who thinks that even talking about policy changes amounts to a casus belli.

Shooting from this is legal.
Businesses that don't pour enough mulch are breaking
the law

Hard choices

There were plenty of runners-up for the Top Ten list, such as the way the CCA Party Town Council majority has raised property taxes for the sixth year in a row, despite big budget surpluses.

Tina Jackson - how many new
laws can SHE break?

There was the Helicopter Gunship incident where we learned that in a town that regulates just about everything, apparently the town believes there is no law against people firing semi-automatic weapons at the ground from a helicopter. That one made national news.

There were the new and repeated violations of the law by Republican candidate for state Representative Tina Jackson. Her callous disregard for the law is becoming so predictable that it wouldn’t rate a story, if not for her political ambitions.

The Exeter Four - a terrific victory

Charlestown’s deep-seated economic problems and lack of relief for the unemployed was a recurring topic throughout the year. Even though Charlestown is not, as the CCA Party would have you believe, a town of affluent retirees, the CCA acts as if it is.

With the help of a lot more contributors and more hustle, Progressive Charlestown expanded its regional coverage extensively. We won praise and even a little national attention for coverage of the defeat of the gun lobby/Tea Party effort to recall the Exeter Town Council majority. That win may have far-reaching implications.

We also covered regional issues like the Lawrence & Memorial labor dispute, which may be repeated shortly at Westerly Hospital, and problems at Millstone nuclear power plant which is only 20 miles away from Charlestown. 

We also covered Rhode Island’s major civil rights advance, Marriage Equality. We covered climate change and shoreline protection, Charlestown’s appalling recycling record and the full gamut of environmental issues.

All this coverage boosted Progressive Charlestown’s readership to the point where we average 2,000 page-reads a day. Our all-time record went from half a million page-reads on June 30 to one million on November 29.

Unlike our first two years, there wasn’t much news in 2013 about two prominent local figures, Councilor Lisa DiBello who had provided the CCA Party with its ruling majority in 2010-2012, but is no longer a factor, and former Jim Mageau who provided the CCA with its main reason to organize in 2006.

Of course, next year we have the 2014 campaign, which promises to be a battle between the two Charlestowns (the CCA’s world of privilege versus the real world the rest of us live in. And we promise to intensify our efforts to find a cure for that dreaded affliction, humorous dyscognition.