$100,000
“Oops!”
By
Will Collette
 |
| This statement is wrong on two counts - the math is wrong and the claim this will not affect your taxes is false. |
When
the Charlestown
Town Council announced it had made the deal with one of its colleagues,
Councilor Lisa DiBello, to settle her long legal dispute with the town for
$450,000, they said that the direct cost to Charlestown taxpayers would be
$400,000 after a $50,000 payment from the RI Interlocal Trust, the town’s
insurance carrier.
They
said that $382,957.82 would be paid out of the town’s Legal Contingency Fund
which had been funded by tax dollars for such matters. The remaining $17,042.18
was to come from some other, unspecified source. Read the Town's release in its entirety HERE.
The
Council declared that this settlement “has no effect on the town of Charlestown
tax rate.”
As
more facts emerge, it turns out the Council was wrong on where the money would come from and lied about the effects on the tax rate.
 |
| From Town Treasurer Pat Anderson |
According
to Treasurer Anderson, this $100,000 shortfall will be paid from this year’s
“Miscellaneous, legal” line item. We still don’t know where the additional
$17,042.18 will come from.
It also seems that the town has money for legal costs squirrelled away in many different places in the budget.
It also seems that the town has money for legal costs squirrelled away in many different places in the budget.
The
balance left in the Legal Contingency Fund after the DiBello payout is zero and the “Miscellaneous,
legal” line item will be light by at least $100,000.
All
of this is taxpayer money and will most certainly affect the tax rate you and I
pay. Sure, they aren’t changing the tax rate for this year but if we hadn’t
used the money for the settlement it would be available for other uses, such as
lowering taxes next year.
It is a lie for the Town Council to imply otherwise,
but it’s also typical of the Council majority to tell lies even when they don’t
need to do so.
Now
that the CCA Party has taken over control of the Zoning Board of Review I
predict that we will need to put a lot of money back into the Legal Contingency
Fund. Lots more.
Here’s
why: appeals of adverse decisions either by the Planning Commission or our town
Zoning Officer go to the Zoning Board of Review. It takes a super-majority
(four votes) to overturn a town ruling and uphold an appeal.
With
three
of the five ZBR members now CCA Party loyalists, you can count on them to
vote according to the CCA Party ideology and not the law on appeals that come before them. That, after
all, is the reason behind the CCA Party's purge that has led four ZBR members to either be kicked off or encouraged to resign just in the past several months.
Appellants will almost certainly lose
their appeals before the new ZBR - they can only win if two of the CCA boys on the ZBR vote to grant their appeal which seems highly unlikely - and will then need to turn to the Superior Court.
Since
we can count on CCA
Party-driven ZBR decisions that will be very vulnerable on appeal, we
should expect to see lots of court decisions for the appellants and against the
town of Charlestown.
The town will certainly be assessed for the appellants’
legal costs and who knows what other sanctions.
This
isn’t going to happen for a year or two at least, simply given the way the court system works.
I wouldn’t be surprised if
the CCA Party majority on the ZBR also goes into a deep stall and holds off
on hearing appeals for as long as the statute allows. Then, I’d expect the town
would want to use every trick in the book to delay any of the court appeals
from going to a decision.
That's because
the town will lose and the taxpayers will pay. But in the meantime, the CCA
Party will get what it wants, which is to bring the town to a standstill.
