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housing

    CIVICS

    Truro Planning Board Called Out for Opposing Housing

    A lobsterman takes the board to court and wins

    By

    TRURO — A local lobsterman feels vindicated after a judge reversed two conditions that the Truro Planning Board had imposed on his building proposal.

    Orleans District Court Judge Robert Welsh III agreed with Christopher and Heidi Townsend, who sought permission to build a 30-by-36-foot barn with an upstairs 1,000-square-foot accessory dwelling unit at their 41 Highland Road property. Townsend intends to use the accessary dwelling unit to house his lobster boat mate.

    Townsend Barn
    Christopher and Heidi Townsend recently built this barn and will be adding an accessory dwelling unit. A judge said the conditions imposed by the planning board for the ADU were outside the board’s authority. (Photo K.C. Myers)

    The planning board approved his request but with a condition that any shower or bathtub be on the second floor. The planning board also required Townsend to get a letter of approval from the Cape Cod National Seashore, since the property is in the Seashore.

    Welsh ruled that both conditions were outside the board’s authority.

    “The location of bathing facilities are not specified in the ADU [Accessory Dwelling Unit] bylaw and have no connection to the stated purpose of the bylaw,” Welsh wrote in his summary judgment on Nov. 26. “Truro improperly delegated permit approval authority to the United States. Zoning is inherently a local concern.”

    The decision has re-ignited an ongoing complaint that Truro’s planning board, which is among the few that are elected on the Cape, is particularly hostile to development.

    Addressing the condition requiring approval from the Seashore, the town’s own attorney, Jonathan Silverstein, wrote a letter to Town Manager Rae Ann Palmer advising that it was unnecessary for this ADU.

    The planning board imposed the condition anyway. So when Townsend challenged the conditions in court, the select board voted not to defend the decision.

    “It was a weak case for the town,” said Selectman Robert Weinstein. “We chose not to have town counsel defend the planning board.”

    Townsend said he was happy with the judge’s ruling, but that battling the planning board added legal fees for his attorney, Ben Zehnder, to the expense of paying rent for his employee for an extra season. He had hoped to begin construction in December 2018, but the permitting process with the planning board lasted all winter and he could not finish it in time for summer.

    Townsend said that the planning board’s decisions show a pattern of discouraging year-round businesses and housing.

    “They are extremely difficult, and they are clearly working against everyone’s wants and needs,” Townsend said. “I’m very passionate about the Outer Cape, and I want it to be easier for people who work for a living like myself.”

    “The planning board was doing the best it could to protect the town and the Seashore,” said Steve Sollog, its chair. “We’re citizens. I’m not going to represent a position or opinion, because as a member of the planning board, I’m representing the town. We made our decision. The town made its decision. The court made its decision, and we’re all going to move on.”

    Weinstein agreed with Townsend, noting that recent bylaw changes to promote year-round housing were brought to town meeting by petitioners and were opposed by the planning board. These included the bylaw that relaxed restrictions on accessory dwelling units in 2017 and the change to allow cottage colonies to be converted for year-round use in 2018.

    “Their record concerns me,” Weinstein said.

    Karen Tosh, a planning board member since 2017, said she disagrees that her board is against affordable housing. Since the ADU bylaw passed, all six ADU applications that have come before the board have been approved.

    But, she added, the planning board has been hampered by a lack of consistent professional help. In three years there have been seven town planners, she said. This has made reviews of projects lengthy and made it more difficult for them to bring bylaws to town meeting.

    Unlike in Provincetown, Wellfleet, and Eastham, Truro’s planning board is elected, which, Weinstein said, may be part of the problem. Nine out of the 15 Cape towns appoint planning board members, said Robert Panessiti, chair of the Truro Charter Review Committee and a member of the Truro Finance Committee for 18 years.

    “[The planning board] should be on the same page, with the same priorities, as the select board,” Weinstein said. No one wants to compete for those seats, he added, so most people get on the board unopposed or as write-in candidates.

    Panessiti said that current planning board members blatantly oppose affordable housing measures. He said the charter committee hasn’t decided whether to recommend changing the planning board from elected to appointed. But, he added, if the current planning board members were to stay on, then “absolutely. They should all be gone,” he said.

    “Sometimes the loudest voices are not the most well informed,” Tosh said in response to the criticism. An elected planning board is pure democracy and best represents the town, Tosh said. If people don’t like them, they should use the ballot box.

    LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

    Letters, Nov. 21: VFW Debate, Orly’s Rope, Artists Identified

    By

    Chief Trovato’s Vision

    To the editor:

    Fire Chief Mike Trovato’s vision for the VFW site as a police station and first-responder housing and substation actually sees our needs. This vision makes so much sense to so many people.

    Proper response is what Mike has been doing for years. He was given an extension on the mandatory rule for retirement because of his excellent record for keeping the town and the first responders safe.

    The select board “came down hard” on Mike’s plan, the Independent reported last week. At the same meeting they voted to give the remaining sewer gallons for housing to a longtime local businessperson for his workers. I agree with the board’s vote to let the businesses provide housing for their workers. Businesses can also pay their workers a living wage so they can live here without having to go through the process for affordable housing.

    We can all agree we need more housing for everyone of modest means. But housing more people before housing first responders is putting the cart before the horse.

    We need the town to provide for first responders so we can all live here safely. Mike’s vision for the VFW site is sound and will meet the needs of the town now with a police station and into the future with fire and rescue. It has been such a drawn-out process for the police station that using the VFW is the best solution.

    We can either see this as our chief and 200-plus residents see it — the perfect opportunity to move forward on a project that has been on hold for far too long — or we can let it get lost again in more process.

    Jean Horner

    Provincetown and Truro

     

    Artists Identified

    To the editor:

    There is a wonderful photograph on page 19 of the Nov. 14 Provincetown Independent featuring many world-renowned artist members of the Provincetown Art Association. The gentleman on the right side of the photo with a beard wearing a bow tie is listed in the caption as “unknown.”

    I am writing to identify him as painter-illustrator Ben Wolf, who was closely acquainted with my uncle, the painter Edwin Dickinson. Mr. Wolf was also my freshman painting instructor in 1957 at the Philadelphia Museum School of Art.

    Frank Foley, Eastham

    Editors’ note: Our thanks to Frank Foley for identifying Ben Wolf at the far right in Arnold Newman’s 1960 photograph of Provincetown Art Association members. Gallerist Berta Walker confirmed that it is Wolf — she contacted the Independent after we’d gone to press and added two other identities: sitting second to the right, below Ben Wolf and Gerrit Hondius, is Harry Engel (whom we guessed might be Will Barnet); and, at the far left, sitting and holding glasses, is Umberto Romano. The man holding a pipe in the center of the photo remains unknown to us.

     

    A Caption Correction

    To the editor:

    While I appreciated the announcement of the Center for Coastal Studies’ Nov. 19 Local Bounty Banquet benefitting our ghost gear recovery project, the caption under the eye-catching image on page 20 of last week’s issue was inaccurate.

    The photo was of Orly Genger’s “Red, Yellow and Blue,” which was installed in Madison Square Park in New York City about seven years ago. It was built with rope from the commercial lobster fishery, which I had secured for the Brooklyn artist. That massive sculpture was dismantled after six months at the park to be installed at the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum in Lincoln, and after another year went on to become other unique iterations of rope sculpture, such as “Terra” (in Oklahoma), “Current” (in Austin), and “Hot Rod” (in Chicago).

    Working with Orly was a privilege, but I am also honored to know other artists who work with material from the fishing industry and who were represented at the Local Bounty Banquet, including Sarah Thornington from West Yarmouth, John and Alicia Morgan from Sandwich, Cindy Pease Roe from Greenport, N.Y., and Gin Stone from Harwich.

    Laura Ludwig, Provincetown

    The writer is director of the Marine Debris and Plastics Program at the Center for Coastal Studies.

     

     

    the observer

    A Model for Bridging Our Divides

    Maine’s Island Institute is helping coastal communities adapt

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — Tell me if you have heard this one: A coastal community, remote, popular, seasonal, with a shrinking population because the year-round jobs are disappearing while housing costs climb, driven not by local conditions but by the purchasing power of its second-home owners, while the year-round residents struggle to secure just one. The community isn’t sure what can be done, but tries every avenue open to it. Sound like Provincetown?

    It’s not. It’s one of more than a hundred communities along the coast of Maine that are facing the same challenges as we are. The difference between our situation and theirs is that they have a unique community foundation, the Island Institute, to work on these issues.

    The institute’s mission is to exchange ideas and experiences to further the sustainability of Maine’s island and coastal communities. Through the Island Institute, year-round and seasonal residents have joined to bridge the divide between locals and second-home owners, a divide that seems to grow as the cost of living continues to rise. Since 1983 the institute has focused locally on the economy, housing and community life, and preparing for climate change, even creating and underwriting a local newspaper.

    How do you bridge the gap between the economic extremes, create opportunity, and support a vibrant year-round community? For the Island Institute, it’s a unique program that places interns in individual communities to work for a year on projects that the locals — predominantly the year-round residents — have designated as priorities, underwritten by philanthropy largely by the new money that has helped to alter the local landscape. The top priorities will sound familiar in Provincetown: small business training and support, aquaculture business development, high-speed broadband access, access to affordable renewable energy, and leading coastal resilience efforts.

    The institute’s record is impressive. According to its website, 405 businesses have received coaching and training in the past 15 months; 65 communities have been supported in working toward accessible, high-speed broadband; 45 communities have received technical assistance or training for sea level rise flooding resiliency.

    The institute’s leaders recognized that locals and second-home owners shared a common love for their towns. As Roger Fisher says in his classic Getting to Yes, one way to move beyond conflict is to find a common problem both parties want to solve. Working together builds trust — maybe not at first but over time. The institute, acting as a bridge, mediated conflicting expectations, found common solutions, and built trust and engagement.

    Our core issue is how to bridge the income inequality so present in our community. There are many Provincetowns, and each person’s experience is valid. Each of us in our own way loves and cherishes this town. The question is how we bridge the divides.

    The Island Institute has been responsive to local priorities by listening to and helping the year-round resident while leveraging the second-home owner’s good will and philanthropy. There is a lot of money in Provincetown that wants to do good and find ways to be helpful.

    It’s not clear that a Provincetown community foundation is achievable. We may be too small, or too contentious to unite before the waters rise. But I believe we can address the growing economic divide by looking at successful models like the Island Institute. Its example proves that there are ways to bring people together. It doesn’t require a group hug or forced pleasantries, but it does require hard work and something like a community foundation acting as an honest broker among factions, committed to community engagement and professional management practices, owned by none and open to participation by everyone.

     

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