On Monday, Nov. 17, for the second time in its 14-year history, the Northampton Citizens Advisory Committee invited the public to participate in one of its meetings. More accurately, the CAC's chair, Mayor Mary Clare Higgins, let the public speak.
In the past, the public has been welcome to sit and watch during CAC deliberations. During the CAC's June 18 meeting this year—the meeting a month after Kollmorgen Electro Optical was unanimously voted onto the site—Higgins broke precedent and opened the floor to questions. The meeting had been better attended than most, but with the vote already cast, opponents could do little more than let off steam. At last week's meeting, however, the public was invited to speak before the vote on a plan to add up to 100 extra housing units to the nearly 200 already approved for Hospital Hill.
The epic three-hour meeting drew a big crowd, noticeably improving the quality as well as the quantity of discourse. Though the CAC had already spent hours discussing the topic twice before, the public raised many new questions—for example, why were 100 houses being requested when the plan only showed 63 new homes packed into the available land?
The public also brought out another long-dormant capability on the part of the CAC: perfect attendance. (On average, four or five of the voting members, nearly a third, have failed to attend meetings even when important votes were scheduled; four members were absent for the Kollmorgen vote.)
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The meeting opened with Beth Murphy of MassDevelopment and Lawrence S. Spang of Arrowstreet Architects explaining the reasons the 100 extra houses were necessary to their development, even though they'd barely completed half of what already had been approved. Though the CAC had raised concerns during the earlier presentations, MassDevelopment and Arrowstreet have made no apparent effort to incorporate that feedback.
When it was time for the public to speak, the CAC got an earful. Several residents pointed to current economic conditions as obvious reasons to delay voting on the proposed 100 homes. Other residents raised concerns about the health of the 160-year-old trees on the site. Ed Hagelstein voiced serious concern about the 6,417 car trips the developers say the new housing will add to the Hospital Hill traffic. He recalled how the addition of 4,000 cars to the streets of Northampton during the Warp Tour at the Fairgrounds a few years ago had "brought the city to its knees."
In some cases, the public speakout was used by city officials: George Kohout, the vice-chair of the Northampton Planning Board, addressed the committee as a member of the public. He said he spoke on behalf of his other Planning Board members when he voiced concern that the CAC and the Board were involved in a dance over purview and who got to approve what—issues that have never been raised by Planning Board chairman Frandy Johnson, who sits on the CAC.
After giving the public its chance to speak, Higgins announced that prior to voting on the additional housing, she would arrange a meeting between the CAC and the Planning Board to clarify their working relationship. (The meeting will be held on Monday, Dec. 1 at 7 p.m. in the J.F.K. Middle School community room.)
At last week's meeting, resident Gary Hirsh questioned what the financial impact on the city from the proposed new housing would be. Higgins said that except for snow removal, the impact would be light. City Planner Wayne Feiden provided demographic projections that estimated the 297 units would house only 538 people—less than the current city average of 3.39 residents per household for new suburban neighborhoods—only 52 of whom would be attending school, which was the greatest cost to the city. The mayor explained that costs such as water and sewage would be paid for by fees already in place, and that the projected growth was not sufficient to need extra firefighters or police.
Conventional wisdom is that the tax raised from straight-up housing developments is often a wash because of the additional cost of services. In this case, the mayor maintained that the taxes raised from the new development would, in fact, make the city money. Working the numbers on her legal pad with her calculator in hand, and stressing that it was only a rough estimate, she projected the city would make $1.7 million a year if the new houses were built. After two meetings spent collecting questions—from other CAC members and now from the general public—this was the first time the mayor had offered an answer many had been grasping for. In this economy, why plan a housing development? This was the first time the mayor had described the Hospital Hill housing development as a profit-generating venture.
Harriet Diamond, representing the Grove Street neighborhood, worried that, while everyone called the plan speculative, it was in danger of becoming the de facto plan because there was nothing to compare it to. Possibly, Diamond suggested, a second plan could be drawn that included more of the design considerations CAC members and residents had been proposing. Higgins recommended that Diamond look at the diagram of the current development, without anything built in the northern portion, and imagine for herself how a different plan might look.
Real estate broker and Ward 5 city councilor David Murphy asked the CAC to delay its decision on further housing until the units already approved are built and occupied: "Let the current units let you know if the estimates are correct. Lots can be learned from the absorption of the units."
Two and a half hours into the meeting, CAC member Charles DeRose asked the mayor whether they were going to vote and to remind him the purpose of the meeting. She said she was gathering questions to prepare for a future presentation. She herself didn't ask any, though. As chair, instead of being an impassive facilitator and reserving judgment, she's defended the plan, answering what she could, and directing other questions to the developers, architect, or city staff.
If the plan had changed and been updated after each meeting, it could be argued that the mayor was doing something with all those questions: responding to feedback and working toward consensus. But, in light of an unchanged and apparently unchanging plan, it appears that Higgins is delaying the vote merely for the sake of appearing to care about public input, stalling the vote until everyone is in agreement or tired of discussing it further.
For their part, the CAC appears as if they might suddenly have recognized that they have more options than just raising questions and voting yes. They can challenge the answers they're given; they can challenge the chair's authority; ultimately, they can vote no to 100 more housing units on Hospital Hill.
The next meeting of the CAC is scheduled for Tuesday, December 9, 7 p.m. at the JFK Middle School community room. The public will be invited to speak.
