An Unfolding Confluence of Events
Meaningful coincidence lead the way through the valley and the shadows.
Just as I am preparing to be in the show (promoted above) at the Merry Barn, an article emerges in the Boothbay Register about The Merry Barn. The headline says it is closing but the last line says it isn’t, it is just changing stewardship and from what it says, there is no future stewardship lined up.
After that, McSherry hopes to pass the torch to the next steward of the barn who will usher it into a new era. The possibilities are endless. The Boothbay Register Merry Barn closing its doors at year's end
Now that is just too much of a coincidence! so I took the bold step of saying “How about a place for an organization representing grassroots entrepreneurs.” in the comments, and promised to have promotional material printed up at the show this weekend at the Merry Barn. That will include my Inquiry for A Grant for the Graham Grant for Individuals and my proposal for a Museum of Makers. I have no idea what stewardship involves but I have been talking about forming an organization for a while, now I would like to walk the talk. Perhaps this is a pathway opening up.
“Step into your power” are the words of a currently popular song that resonates like a siren call to action, sung with a cadence that is calmly uplifting. Just do it, one step after another, don’t hesitate, don’t rush, just let it all unfold, says the calm and steady voice of the singer. How many souls will be awakened to take themselves seriously by this simple melody rafting through popular culture?
Meanwhile, there is a new report in the Boothbay Register about the Butler Road development. The Boothbay Regional Development Corporation appears to be trying to avoid a traffic study and is getting away with it. Online commenters, including yours truly, are protesting. The Town ordinances governing traffic studies were written before LD 2003 was enacted. Before then who would think a law would codify that developers need only provide two-thirds of the parking needed as a bare minimum by the inhabitants?
Others rarely talk about what is in the law, so I brought it up,
That conversation was yesterday, Tod Barter picked up on the inadequate parking hypothesizing about shoot-outs over parking spaces, and had a lot more to say.
We are lucky that the Boothbay Register acts as a true fourth estate but the next day the article was not to be found in any of the story listings. To confirm, I searched the title using the Boothbay Register search function and it came up empty. This occasionally happens with Bothbay Register stories, more often than once with stories involving the Boothbay Regional Development Corporation, but you can still google the title to produce the Boothbay Register article. The title is BRDC receives prelim approval for Butler Road subdivision. Its publishing date is 9.20.2024 but I only noticed the story a couple of days ago, I also could not find the article by scrolling through many stories on Disqus which usually lists stories with active comments first.
Another recent story that cannot be found using Boothbay Register Search function is With 3 area towns on the '50 most expensive' list, what does it mean for property taxes? The topic of the discussion goes into short-term rentals.
Keep the hidden conversation going with a comment.
Note added 10/4/2024 THe stories are back. They can be found using the REgister search function and on Page 1 of news stories, towards the bottom, if not on the home page of news stories
Town leadership tells us that they must obey LD 2003 even as it violates municipal Home Rule rights, though they never mention Home Rule. The statement was made that “Under the municipal ordinance, the developer is required to provide a traffic survey with developments seeking 40 or more parking spots.” The implication was that the Town could not demand or request the study because the development is planning only 38 off-street parking spaces. The developer is seeking more than 40 parking spots because they are planning for 38 off-street parking spots, but by the words of the law that their own VP co-authored, off-street parking spots can represent 2/3rds of the total planned parking spots, the other third will be on-street parking spots. That calls for a traffic study. The developers are trying to avoid a traffic study for a good cause. They might have to explain how shorting the residents a third of the minimum parking spaces works in practice which a traffic study should consider.
Ms Cooperrider announced that the redevelopment is targeting an income cap greater than the income cap written into the law that she co-authored. The law caps the income for ownership at 120% of the median income for the area, Cooperrider ups the cap to 125%. Town leadership said nothing about the change,
The first twenty units are the ones that will be sold, without land rights. The higher the income cap the more money for financing the project. 20 units with 38 parking spaces lends the appearance of generous parking but the eventual plan calls for 162 units and the developers need only provide 2 parking spaces for 3 units. Fewer parking spaces means more space for units, a “density bonus” for the nonprofit corporation and its private equity investors.
One of the most impractical mandates in the law sounds reasonable but isn’t, especially not for a municipal ordinance that applies everywhere in Maine.
§5250-U. Priority development zones required A municipality shall designate an area within the municipality as a priority development zone. A priority development zone must be located in an area that has significant potential for housing development and is located near community resources, as determined by the Department of Economic and Community Development. A priority development zone must comply with the requirements of this section and any rules adopted under subsection 3. 21 1. Definitions. For the purposes of this section, the following terms have the following meanings. A. "Community resources"
means services available to the community within a municipality, including but not limited to transportation, schools, recreational opportunities and any other services provided by the municipality."Community resources" also includes business and employment opportunities within the municipality
Did the authors of this law think that communities across Maine would tear everything down and start afresh to comply with this law? This is saying that in urbanized areas the priority zones must be located in the most prime real estate in the community, which is already developed. In rural areas, perhaps they can be built around the fire station in municipalities such as Southport, or around the library at one end of the island or the general store at the other. Do the authors expect areas “with significant potential for housing development” to be conveniently located near municipal resources? Even the plot of land that the Boothbay Regional Development Corporation has chosen for its urban block doesn’t meet the requirements especially when the shortage of parking spaces is factored in, which means proximity should be measured in walking distance.
For the Butler Road location to qualify under §5250-U. Priority development zones would require that the Town create a public transportation system to serve the Butler Road location, or the Town might finance a municipal parking lot close to the development to handle the minimum 54 parking spaces not provided for 126 units. This would require a traffic study. If they are not going to factor in the third of the parking spaces designated to be on the street now, what happens later on when the Town realizes LD 2003 requires them to spend additional money on resolving the parking problem? Such being the case, can the municipalities so affected argue that
Section 21. State mandates apply calling for the State to provide annually 90% of the funding for these expenditures from State funds not previously appropriated to that local unit of government?
It’s hard to keep track of the many ways the rule of law is broken in Maine and not become diverted by it. While researching this subject I discovered that there is a new right added to the Maine Constitution called "Section 25. Right to food.".
I don't recall there being a local referendum on this constitutional amendment as required by Section 4. Amendments to the Constitution. of the Maine Constitution but it is already to be found in th online version of the Maine Constitution, no longer a stand-alone easy to access document, but instead found on the Maine Statutes website with a blue background consistent with the background color of Maine statutory law.
Does anyone else recall such an amendment to our Constitution being on their local ballot?
Note added later: According to Ballotopedia:
Maine Question 3, the Right to Produce, Harvest, and Consume Food Amendment, was on the ballot in Maine as a legislatively referred constitutional amendment on November 2, 2021. It was approved.A "yes" vote supported this constitutional amendment to create a state right to growing, raising, harvesting, and producing food, as long as an individual does not commit trespassing, theft, poaching, or abuses to private land, public land, or natural resources.
A "no" vote opposed this constitutional amendment to create a state right to growing, raising, harvesting, and producing food.
Should we organize a citizen’s petition to have “The Right To Parking Spaces” added as an amendment to the Maine Constitution?
Mandating that priority zones of unregulated density and inadequate parking spaces be in every municipality in Maine, invites speculation about hidden intentions to discourage the ownership of cars among the working classes in Maine, a rural state. The law also forbids municipal planners from referring to overcrowding, overpopulation, or the character of the location, while it sets rules for community character across all of Maine. The restriction on speech is legally challenging as a violation of the Second Amendment of the US Constitution.
There are no community resources in walking distance of Butler Road that I am aware of and it is even relatively remote from municipal resources by driving. The Butler Road development, headed up by the co-author of the act as the first development after LD 2003 was enacted, doesn't meet the criterion of the act, supporting the theory that the authors are fully aware that the requirement that priority zones be close to transportation and municipal resources is unrealistic.
LD 2003 calls for the priority zone to be close to:
transportation, schools, recreational opportunities and any other services provided by the municipality."Community resources" also includes business and employment opportunities within the municipality
So basically the plan is to concentrate all human living for the bottom 75% of the economy within urban centers leaving the rural areas for the food and forest industries and resorts for the wealthy.
The concept that I have been advancing of intentional priority zones for small businesses including some that are in or attached to a home fits the bill better:
Transportation:
The law was written as one size fits all but many Maine communities do not have public transportation so priority zones need to provide abundant parking facilities. That seems like a given. However, it isn’t. Priority zones intentionally allow inadequate parking spaces so the intentional community I am envisioning should not be in a priority zone.
Schools,-
Schools are currently a big debate, suffice it to say that there has been a transformation underway during the last decade to transform public school systems into workforce training facilities with much being made about “making spaces” To keep it short and sweet, if a public school can be an industrial training center, then industrial training is education so priority zone for small entrepreneurs offers educational alternative. I envision a Museum of Small Entrepreneurs and Makers as located within the zones. Museums are also educational. It can be the free enterprise system’s equivalency of “the Maine Space economy” but instead a networked free enterprise economy with different aspects dispersed among different communities.
Recreational opportunities and any other services provided by the municipality.
I don’t know what “provided by the municipality” is supposed to mean but recreational opportunities are everywhere provided by numerous resources including the natural world around us. Recreational activities should not be difficult to incorporate into a community. There are a lot of options. Everything does not have to be controlled by the municipal government as the authors of LD 2003 envision.
Business and employment opportunities within the municipality
A community built to accommodate businesses in a home and other small businesses would provide many opportunities. Businesses provide the resources we need so rather than having to be near another business center, the resources would be provided by the community itself and built into the design.
The one big problem with complying with LD 2003 is the term “affordable housing” and the income caps that come with it which are oppressive to an opportunity economy. The reason priority zones are needed is because unregulated short-term rentals are driving up the price of all real estate so the state created priority zones where the local residents can be relocated to suburban-style developments that are only for dwelling and have no other activity. This notion is based in the concept of production housing and housing stock where the state and municipal government speak the language of commercial manufacturers. Thus the developments have to be (theoretically) located near centers of municipal resources, but it seems self-evident that even the authors of the law do not take that seriously.
The priority zones forbid rentals for less than thirty days, It is like setting up a different economic system within the zones, wherein absent short-term rentals, housing becomes more affordable but even as it provides some protection against the vampire industry, the minimum allowed period for rentals is thirty days, that is to say that summer homes will also be income capped within a rigidly structured caste society.
Selectmen came to a consensus on some of the draft language for proposed ordinances. They agreed an accessory dwelling unit should be defined as having a maximum 800 square-foot living area, and it should be rented out for a minimum of four months.
“The goal is to create long term housing (stock),” Allen said.
Selectman Ken Rayle added, the town is largely a seasonal town for the summer months and the ordinance language should acknowledge that. “I think part of the character of our town is this whole seasonal essence and workers that come in temporarily,” he said. The season is four to five months, he said.
Boothbay Harbor selectboard discusses public input on LD2003 09/12/2024
Like Ms. Cooperrider, Mr. Rayle believes that the special interests of his industry should be codified as general law. As a member of local government, he does not believe that government exists to serve the whole economy. and the exclusivity and dominance of seasonal industries should be codified into the Town ordinances. Look around! Boothbay Harbor is not a ghost town in the winter!
i don’t know if an external means would be necessary to ensure affordability in an intentional community for businesses in a home and small entrepreneurs but you can’t cap people’s aspirations as an economic development policy, and housing is inextricably linked to economic development. “Bold persistent experimentation” is needed to develop a new economic model based on fluidity and avenues where people can develop their aspirations. Right now the priority zones represent a oppressive cultural grid designed to stop aspirations and keep everyone in the lower 75% of the economy in their places, permanently.
The best idea is for the alternate system to coordinate with the government system so that better income-capped communities are designed and the alternate system can be a way for the inhabitants to transition out of the income-capped system. At certain stages the income-capped system can fulfill the needs of the moment. If there are avenues for transitioning to the opportunity system, both systems can support each other.
In the old days, they called what I am talking about, a town but today there has to be a special economic zone for towns. The default economic zoning is for short-term rental vacation theme parks, zoned for transient communities as suggested by Mr. Rayle. But within that, there need to be intentional communities zoned for a society in which wealth is equitably distributed and ordinances and culture are inclusive of all.