Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Recap of Night 3 (session 2)

We got a lot done last night.

Animal Control
I was pleased to witness members not get confused or distracted by all the new language in our animal control bylaws, taken up under Article 13.

As I said yesterday, this language is largely taken straight from state law, and while it changes a lot what our bylaws look like, it does not change much of anything with regards to owning a dog in Arlington.

Self-Serve Gasoline
Next up was Article 14, which sought to permit self-serve gasoline in Arlington.

However upon reviewing work being done to update our zoning bylaws, and hearing some of the concerns people had the proponent, Carl Wagner, chose to ask us to wait a bit and not pass this yet.

There are concerns that if passed we could have large, "mega-stations" permitted in town, without buffers between them and residential areas.

Also, many flaws in the current Americans with Disabilities Act that are supposed to insure that those that cannot pump their own gas receive full service, have been identified.

The proponent felt it better to study these issues and act on more information at a later date.

I believe this was a highlight of our democratic process - an example of when and how our system of government really shines.

John Worden got up and gave an excellent speech on why full service should be preserved, whether or not self-serve is allowed.

His testimony was both very entertaining and relevant, right up until the end.

Then he closed with a comment suggesting station attendants, if asked to pump someone's gas, would pretend they were unable to speak English.

I hope Mr. Worden will issue an apology for this.

It was in exceptionally poor taste, unbecoming of the level of respect and decorum to be expected of this body.

I felt it wise to vote for his amendment, as it provided a safety should the main article pass.

The amendment was voted down, and the main motion was voted down.

Resolutions on Utility Poles, Overnight Parking Fees
Moving on, we voted on two resolutions last night. One asking the Board of Selectmen to pursue remedies for unsafe or otherwise unnecessary utility poles, and another asking the Board of Selectmen to address the fees associated with on street parking permits.

I voted for both resolutions, largely because they were resolutions, and did not carry legal weight.

The utility companies failure to deal with old poles is real. As a speaker said, they don't earn any money by taking old poles down. There's too little motivation for them to address this problem.

My thoughts: regardless of the specific language in the resolution we passed, let the Board of Selectmen deal with this in whatever way they see fit, but knowing that we also consider it a real issue that needs addressed.

I would of preferred the second resolution regarding overnight parking fees not include any dollar amounts. It did, but since it was a resolution only I still voted for it.

My thoughts: these permits are only issued in very limited cases (something like 80 are currently issued) where a real hardship exists with regards to parking availability.

They are not issued because people have a third car they want to park somewhere or any trivial reason like that.

They are issued because structurally or geographically, off-street parking simply is not possible.

A lengthy process must be undertaken to obtain one of these permits, including review by a committee, and ultimate approval by the Board of Selectmen.

Once a decision is made to issue such a permit, I see no need to charge an excessive amount for it.

So my vote in favor is intended to send a message to the Board of Selectmen that I feel they should charge a reasonable amount, that covers the costs of issuing the permit, but no more than that.

The Board can feel free to ignore any mention of a specific dollar amount in that resolution, as far as I am concerned.

Just kindly consider the spirit of the resolution, and I'll be happy.

A drawback of getting a lot done at last night's session is that I am running out of time to write up all I would like for this review.

There were several more votes I considered significant last night, including an age exemption for a candidate for police officer, the establishment of a public art fund, and compensation for retirement board members.

I hope to write up my thoughts on those votes soon, but will save that for another time.

We worked through 17 articles last night, and ought to conclude this year's Town Meeting in a couple more sessions.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Preview of Session 2: Dogs, Gasoline, Utility Poles, and Parking

The second session of the 2013 Town Meeting takes place tonight.

It is our third time meeting, but last Wednesday was a Special Town Meeting, distinct from 2013's annual meeting.

We may move through a lot of articles tonight, or we may decide to debate one or more at length.

First up tonight is Article 13, a revision of our Animal Control bylaws.

This is a necessary housekeeping measure, reflecting changes made to state law last year.

In writing these revisions our Town Counsel has taken what I believe to be a positive approach, adding in a lot of topics not previously spelled out in Town bylaw.

She has picked through the state law, and included everything she thought a local resident might want or need to know.

In the past our law only stipulated a few things, relying on state law to cover everything else.

It is still true that we are bound by state law whether these items are listed in our town bylaws or not, but this makes it much easier for residents to look something up should they have questions.

This revision makes no fundamental changes to what is currently allowed or disallowed in Arlington as pertains to dogs.

Because of this I am hopeful that Town Meeting won't use this opportunity to engage in old debates about whether dogs and owners should have more or less liberties in town than they currently do.

Again, because the language in this rewrite is largely copied straight from state law, it is questionable whether any changes could legally be made.

Given the complexity of the law, and since no one has to date submitted any amendments, any attempts to make changes tonight would likely not be allowed by the moderator.

Nonetheless some members could revisit old fights, and slow things down considerably.

I hope not.

After Article 13, we consider Article 14, permitting self-serve gasoline in Arlington.

I have heard, but haven't confirmed that the proponents of this may ask to reject this tonight, so they can address some other issues that have been identified.

No idea on my part what those issues are as yet.

My sense is that I will vote against the article.

Some station owners in town are opposed to it, our gasoline prices are not higher than neighboring communities now, and a lot of residents I've heard from have real concerns about making this change.

Some want the option of self serve, but most - like myself - just don't really care.

After that we have Article 15, giving Selectmen the power to regulate utility poles, requiring replacement when they are deficient, and that sort of thing.

The Board of Selectmen have recommended No Action on this article.

In their comment, they state they are unsure they posses the legal authority to act on concerns, and feel they will be able to accomplish more by working with the utility companies involved to fix issues.

I'll be interested to hear more about why, and hear arguments from proponents of these changes.

Moving on we have a number of articles, one establishing a principle priority of pedestrian safety in all road projects, and several dealing with parking, parking permits, and fees related to all.

I suspect there will be debate regarding the parking articles.

The Board of Selectmen have recommended No Action on these.

At this time I plan listen to the arguments made and let the strength or weakness of those arguments determine my vote.

There is of course more to come after these. We may get there tonight, we may not.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

Long Night

It was a long night, largely unpleasant.

Not wanting to, but on principle feeling it was the right thing to do, I introduced a substitute motion that would have delayed implementation of last year's leaf blower bylaw, and formed a new committee to try and come up with a better way to address the issues we were charged with resolving.

If my motion had passed, we would have continued to grapple with leaf blowers for another year.

That - believe me - is not something I wanted to do.

But I also don't like walking away from a job so miserably dealt with, so clearly not complete.

I'm both relieved and dismayed that my motion failed.

Ultimately I voted for the recommendations presented to us.

As I've discussed before, I don't feel right about telling people they cannot use leaf blowers.

I do believe they are used irresponsibly many times, and that behavior should be stopped.

When cars are used irresponsibly, we don't ban cars: we look for ways to discourage the behavior we don't want.

We have not figured out a way to accomplish this with leaf blowers yet.
(Saving any arguments about carbon emissions and the environment for another day. I don't feel our debate about leaf blowers has ever - successfully anyway - risen to this point. If we do concern ourselves with this someday, I think we should deal with emissions and not what devices produce them, at least without very strong justification.)
For reasons I've already discussed, I voted against the bottled water ban.

Much of the testimony from other opponents was turning me off.

The more I heard from people also opposed to the ban, the more I felt like changing my vote.

"If you ban bottled water, people will just drink other stuff!"

Speak to the problem being addressed. When people want a soft drink, they get a soft drink. Water satisfies thirst, it is craved when needed. People won't stop drinking it.

"If we can't carry a water bottle to some event, we won't have any water to drink!"

You can carry a bottle you've filled with water just a easily as you can one you've purchased at the store, can't you?

"Think of all the kids at sporting events!"

Back when, in the uh, olden days I guess, we brought large igloo containers to youth sporting events, filled with water and ice.

When I hear arguments that I believe are weak or disingenuous, I am tempted to change sides on principle.

I do still think a ban is not a good idea.

Not yet anyway.

Get people thinking about what a waste this is, and we'll see what people want to do down the road.

So for now we are done talking about bottled water and leaf blowers.

I've heard rumors that the original proponents of self-serve gasoline are going to ask us to hold off and not pass that article this year.

It almost seems we are fast running out of things to get angry at each other about.

I'm confident though that we will work around this.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Leaf Blowers and Bottled Water


Tonight we hold a Special Town Meeting. The reason we are interrupting ourselves to hold this special meeting is to dispense with any changes to the Leaf Blower bylaw passed last year, so that those changes can go into effect before last year's restrictions have a chance to take place.

While I was opposed to the "seasonal ban" put in place last year, I did feel that proponents had successfully made their case that a problem existed that needed dealt with.

I just did not feel that the seasonal ban was the right tool for the job.

I had hoped that the committee put in place to reach some sort of compromise on this whole mess would come up with a solution for us to consider this year.

Because I wanted to see this committee take it's work seriously, I chose to not vote to repeal the bylaw at the last Special Town Meeting when that option, in addition to forming this committee, was presented to us.

I felt that the committee had a better chance of taking their work seriously if they were working "under the gun," so to speak.

Reviewing the amendments they have provided us my impression is that unfortunately, they did not feel obliged to come up with a serious compromise.

If I understand the amendments correctly, leaf blowers cannot be operated before 7:30 a.m. (8 a.m. on Saturdays), after 5:30 p.m. (4:00 p.m. on Saturdays), or on Sundays or legal Holidays, between the dates of June 15th and September 15th.

Also, and only between those dates, no more than one machine can be used for each 6,000 square feet in lot size, and they may only be used for 30 minutes at a time without a 15 minute break in between.

A nice addition is that within a year, commercial operators must use machines that produce no more than 74 decibels at a distance of 50 feet.

That applies year-round, too.

None of these rules apply to residents operating machines on their own property.

That is a whole lot of words used to say that, for 90 odd days a year, you can't run your leaf blower at an indecent hour. Unless you're working on your own property.

If the only people affected by last year's restrictions were commercial operators, I'd be comfortable rejecting these amendments and giving the parties involved another year to think about how to adequately deal with the real concerns people have.

It would feel just.

However there are residents that have legitimate reasons to use these machines, and are able to do so in a manner that does not impose upon the rights of others.

Banning this, even only for a few months of the year, is not in my opinion the right way to address these issues.

Therefore I plan on voting to amend what was passed last year, and removing the "seasonal ban."

Given how much was not accomplished, I suspect we'll be hearing about this issue again sometime soon.

Also on the table for tonight is an appropriation for a visitor's center at Uncle Sam Plaza, and a prohibition on the sale of bottled water.

I anticipate supporting the appropriation for the visitor's center.

I anticipate opposing the prohibition on bottled water sales.

While I plan to oppose the bottled water ban, I hope the topic gets people thinking.

If this were a ballot question and I were voting my own opinion, I'd support it.

Bottled water can be convenient at times but is also, in my personal opinion, such a ridiculous waste.

We have a water system that has long been the envy of the world.

Bottled water has been shown to be no better in quality, and often much worse in quality, than the water that flows from our taps.

That's my view.

However people need to be brought around to this idea before we can (or should) attempt to legislate it.

Hopefully this article will help spur that conversation.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

2013 Town Meeting Opening Night

Town Meeting commenced last night, and we got an impressive amount of work done, I thought.

Electronic Voting
I am very pleased that we passed Article 12, permitting Electronic Voting.

I serve on the Electronic Voting Study Committee.

A few amendments were offered that would have created serious problems down the road. Those amendments were defeated, and the articles passed as introduced.

Next year, if all goes well, Town Meeting will have this technology available.

As a result Arlingtonians will have access - when the system is used - to the voting records of their Town Meeting members.

There will be times when electronic-voting is not used. Many actions taken by Town Meeting are formalities, that pass unanimously.

For that matter, for many things voice voting is faster, saving time.

Maybe we'll come up with a way for members to record those votes for the record after the fact (for example, when a vote is unanimous, we could choose to post to that effect on the Town's website).

Immediately upon passing Article 12, Al Tosti of the Finance Committee moved to table articles 13 through 41 so we could consider Article 42, the appropriation of funds for electronic voting.

This morning I am undecided if this was done to keep us on topic, or for another reason: the Finance Committee recommended an appropriation of $10,000 for next year.

The catch is, the amount appropriated for next year would see Town Meeting through less than 8, and maybe less than 7 sessions.

There is a chance that Town Meeting may have thought of this and appropriated a bit more money than the $10,000 recommended.

Al Tosti's job is to guard Arlington's budget. It's an important job, and he does it well.

That said it may be a bit awkward next year when we show up one night to find we can't use electronic voting anymore, for however many sessions are left that year.

[Hey: maybe I should lay off any claims about intention here: both staying on topic, and more importantly avoiding a whole other debate on Electronic Voting, after we've already passed Article 12, is a very good reason to bring up Article 42 right away. It still happens that next year could be a bit awkward when Electronic Voting is suddenly unavailable, but that doesn't mean there was intent to avoid the discussion.

There are too many other legitimate, sound reasons for placing Article 42 in front of us last night.]


Medical Marijuana
Articles 7 and 8 dealt with zoning issues around medical marijuana dispensaries.

I was exceptionally conflicted on these votes.

Last year voters in Massachusetts approved medical marijuana. The vote in Arlington was 67.95% in favor to 32.05% opposed.

In Precinct 4, the vote was even more lopsided: 76.29% in favor to 23.71% opposed.

With that vote comes dispensaries.

As much as I like to think people are more rational than this, I doubt voters would be equally enthusiastic about a dispensary being located down the block.

Yes to medical marijuana, but not-in-my-backyard.

That disconnect was partially behind my conflicted feelings with these articles.

Another part was with how senseless I thought it was to vote on these articles last night.

On May 8th, just over 2 weeks from now, the State may finalize guidelines related to how these dispensaries are allowed to operate.

If we had waited a couple weeks, we may have had a much better idea about what it was we were regulating.

Finally, I felt conflicted because this issue was being considered in light of concern over what exposure minors would have to marijuana as a result of these dispensaries existing.

There are people in our community for whom each day is filled with pain.

There was exceptionally little acknowledgment of that fact during discussion last night.

Whether you think the medical use of marijuana is good or bad, I feel we owed those folks a bit more consideration than we gave them.

In the end, I voted for both articles, defining where dispensaries could be located (that vote failed), and instituting a one-year moratorium on establishing dispensaries in Arlington.

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

On this Tuesday Morning, April 16th, 2013



So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm,---
A cry of defiance, and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo for evermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.
From "Paul Revere's Ride" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Town Elections, 2013

Our annual town election happens this Saturday, April 6th.

People can review a sample ballot on the Town’s website, here: 2013 Official Ballot

Also, polling locations can be found here: Precinct Polling Map

Uncontested races this year include the election of our Town Moderator, our Town Assessor, a one-year seat on the School Committee, a five-year seat on the Housing Authority and a two-year seat on the Housing Authority.

Town Meeting
In some precincts there are competitive races for Town Meeting, and in others there are fewer candidates than open seats.

Here in precinct 4, the four incumbent Town Meeting members are on the ballot unchallenged.

Board of Selectmen
There is one seat up on the Board of Selectmen, and long time incumbent Kevin Greeley stands for re-election.

Running against Kevin, in her, um, fourth attempt to get elected, is Maria Romano.

I would like to find the time to talk at length about political divides in town, and what the candidacy of Maria Romano has come to represent, but I will need to save that for another post.

I’m voting for Kevin Greeley.

School Committee
Three candidates are running for two, three year seats on the School Committee.

They include incumbents Kirsi Allison-Ampe and Judson Pierce.

Hoping to pick one of them off is new-comer Michael Buckley.

It is good to see people step up and take an interest in local government, and I hope Mr. Buckley continues to remain involved after this election.

He brings no experience, and a history of non-involvement to the table.

If this were a job interview, his resume would not have made the cut.

Not this year, anyway.

Perhaps he’ll stay involved, and we’ll have a chance to see more of him in the future.

I’m voting for the two incumbents, Kirsi Allison-Ampe and Judson Pierce

Ballot Questions
Given the lack of competitive races this year, it is no wonder that the two non-binding ballot questions will be what most people focus on this year.

Question 1 asks:
Shall the Town have four vehicular travel lanes on Massachusetts Avenue in East Arlington as now practiced?
YES or NO
Personally, I’d prefer six lanes, all underground, with a beautiful, long town plaza on the surface, complete with a ferris wheel, and pony rides for the kids.

What I’d more realistically prefer is a town that could engage in serious, honest debate about issues that impact us.

Instead too much oxygen is sucked up by dishonest rhetoric, aimed more at creating divisions than solving problems.

That though is a topic for another post.

Here is where I stand on the Mass. Ave. project:

I believe that Mass. Ave., in its current configuration, is a dangerous road.

I believe that the stated goals of the project to rebuild Mass. Ave. are goals that I support:
  • Increase safety for all users, especially pedestrians.
  • Create a traffic system that is safe, efficient, and easy to navigate for vehicles, pedestrians, individuals with disabilities, bicyclists, and transit riders.
  • Upgrade the infrastructure -- roads, sidewalks, traffic signals.
  • Improve the Lake Street/Capitol Square business district to create a pedestrian friendly center, where people feel safe and comfortable meeting, shopping, and strolling.

I wish I could see into a crystal ball and say with certainty that the engineers got things right, and the new proposed design of three lanes will work.

I don’t have a crystal ball, so I can’t.

What I do know is that if we are going to use outside money to repair Mass. Ave., we have to accept the strings that come with it.

We cannot have four lanes, unless we want to pay for this project using local funds.

The bulk of the cost associated with doing anything is sucked up in stripping and repaving the street.

To keep four lanes, we have to spend somewhere between $4 and $6 million dollars in as yet un-raised money, that will come from local property taxes.

For that amount of money, I am willing to cross my fingers and hope the engineers got it right.

I am voting "No" on question 1.

Question 2 asks:
Do you favor the Town’s current overnight parking ban?
YES or NO
The Board of Selectmen decided to put this question on the ballot to get a more accurate sense of how residents feel on this issue, and to see if there is a strong difference of opinion in different parts of town.

I am generally in favor of people being able to do things they find convenient, including parking on the street, when it doesn’t adversely impact essential stuff (such as emergency vehicle response rates, in this case).

Related to this question I have heard that we in Arlington pay lower auto insurance rates than we would otherwise, because of the overnight parking ban.

That leaves me conflicted.

I’m still not sure how I will vote on this question. That uncertainty has me leaning toward supporting the status quo.

I feel that people should generally be able to park on the street.

I don’t feel so strongly about it that I think we all should pay more for something like auto insurance.

The one thing I am certain about is that I am glad the question in nonbinding.

I do think the Board was right to put the question on the ballot.

It will be good to know how people feel, and should help inform future decisions on the matter.