Town Meeting wraps up until June

By Scott Merzbach
Staff Writer

Published on May 15, 2009

A series of improvements to the West Cemetery, an increase in the density of residential units in downtown and village centers, better protections for transgender individuals and preservation of open parcels in the Lawrence Swamp area have been approved at annual Town Meeting.

With three sessions completed this spring, Town Meeting Monday adjourned until June 15, when the fiscal year 2010 budgets for the town, schools and libraries, as well as capital purchases, will be brought forward.

Select Board Chairwoman Stephanie O'Keeffe said the month delay is necessary. "As everyone knows, this is an absolutely extraordinary budget year," O'Keeffe said.

She said there are unprecedented unknowns in the budget, including the amount of state funding and whether local option taxes will be available, that could be resolved by this later date.

"From my perspective, the longer we wait, the better," said Town Manager Larry Shaffer.

The Finance Committee will formalize its recommendations May 28 and by the first week in June should have budget books delivered to Town Meeting members.

CPA expenditures

At this week's session, Town Meeting voted to spend $337,800 from the Community Preservation Act account for historic preservation, affordable housing and open space initiatives.

At West Cemetery, $25,000 will be used for historic ironwork restoration and $30,000 for the town tomb reconstruction. "This is necessary to maintain that historic structure," said James Smith of Precinct 6.

Town Meeting members appropriated $20,000 for landscape preservation at the cemetery by a 128-61 vote, even though Mary Streeter of Precinct 8 and Vince O'Connor of Precinct 1, both members of the CPA Committee, said they were opposed to this spending, in part, because the CPA account was being reduced too much. "This is not something urgent to be done right away," Streeter said.

But James Wald of the Historical Commission said the cemetery represents a time capsule of Amherst's social values, aesthetics and history.

"This town is in danger of losing an important resource," Wald said.

Members did reject $7,000 for repair of the roof at the North Congregational Church, even though Lyle Denit of the Historical Commission said town money could be used on a private, religious structure.

Janet Chevan of Precinct 7 said she was uncomfortable with spending CPA money on a church building,

Smith agreed. "There is a definite separation of church and state issue here," Smith said,

Despite an effort to reduce the $65,000 for restoring the historic Civil War tablets, which recognize black soldiers from Amherst and will eventually be displayed at Town Hall, Town Meeting narrowly approved this full CPA expenditure by a 91-84 tally vote.

By a 95-70 tally vote, Town Meeting also agreed to spend $30,000 for historic writers' walk signs that will honor famous Amherst authors.

Town Meeting unanimously agreed to spend $47,200 in CPA money for affordable housing projects, of which $30,000 will be used for a Habitat for Humanity home being constructed on Stanley Street. The other $17,200 represents the minimum 10 percent set aside for future housing projects.

Frontage change

Meanwhile, at the May 6 session, Town Meeting passed, by a two-thirds majority voice vote, a zoning change that reduces the 100-foot minimum frontage requirements for dwellings in the population and commercial centers.

Planning Board member Jonathan O'Keeffe said the frontage minimum is at odds with the idea of facilitating mixed-use developments in downtown and village centers, supported in the draft master plan, and discourages developers from adding residential floors to existing one-story commercial buildings.

By a 107-51 vote, Town Meeting adopted the Mullin Rule, a home-rule petition that allows members of various boards, including the Planning Board and Conservation Commission, to miss one hearing but still vote on the matter at hand.

Before its passage, Streeter and Carol Gray of Precinct 7 urged Town Meeting to vote against it. "Part of being a responsible board member is being present," Gray said.

Though he voted for it, Fred Hartwell, a former member of the Planning Board, said he never missed a hearing during his six years on the board. But now it appears more board members are regularly absent.

"It seems now this is an increasing problem," Hartwell said.

Town Meeting supported expanded rights for various residents. In the first vote, the body unanimously added transgendered individuals to the protected classes in the town's Human Rights Bylaw.

Brett-Genny Janiczek Beemyn, the director of the Stonewall Center at the University of Massachusetts, praised Town Meeting's action. "We are thrilled by the tremendous support shown in the community for the rights of transgender people," said Janiczek Beemyn, in a statement. "The addition of gender identity/expression' to the town's nondiscrimination policy by unanimous vote sends a clear message that such actions will not be tolerated and gives transgender people recourse when such actions occur."

Resident aliens

In the second vote, Town Meeting supported, 136-14, the rights of resident aliens to vote in local elections, a petition that will now go to the state Legislature for consideration.

"It's sort of taxation without representation," said Select Board member Gerry Weiss.

O'Connor said he believes this somewhat regular petition has a chance of now being approved by the state Legislature because a Democrat is now governor.

Another $225,000 in CPA money is targeted for two land acquisitions, including $75,000 to preserve 15 acres on the so-called Johnson property on South East Street, with another $150,000 going to the Olendzki property, a former emu farm.

In other business, Town Meeting:

* spent $25,600 in CPA money for the third of five yearly payments for preserving the Kimball House on North East Street;

* spent $15,000 in CPA money for preparation of bid specifications for repairs to the Jones Library roof, $10,000 to study a climate control system for special collections at the library and $20,000 for the fourth of five yearly payments to pay for the preservation of historic documents;

* approved $10,000 in CPA money for nomination packages for expansion of the Dickinson Historical District and creation of an Amherst Depot District and $15,000 to complete an historic inventory of barns and other outbuildings;

* made a series of budget amendments for the current year's budget to counter state aid cuts;

* mandated Medicare enrollment for all retirees;

* appropriated $3 million for the Hampshire Country Retirement System;

* agreed to spend $31,323 on the Hampshire County Regional Lockup Facility;

* and dissolved the Housing Review Board, a defunct committee no longer allowed in the state because of the prohibition on rent-control agencies.