There may not be much local news converge of Newton and our city council races these days but Western Massachusetts Politics & Insight is a Springfield-based political blog has just posted a piece that looks at Newton commuter rail and even the ward 2 city council contest.
Both Ward 2 City Council candidates, the incumbent Emily Norton and challenger Bryan Barash, support rail investment. They differ on style and rail’s relations to other issues in town.
When I first read it, I did find it interesting that a website from the forgotten part of the state would elect to cover an issue 90 miles away. But that’s why they’re interested. Leaders in Springfield especially want to improve rail service to Boston to reverse decades of decline. Given the likely cost to fix just the three Newton stations, however, that’s a long way off.
It is a shame that we needed a reporter to come from Western Mass to give the best coverage of the intersection of our commuter rail conversations and housing that I’ve seen to date. The MBTA has made it clear that they have no current intention of paying the full cost of our commuter rail upgrades. We need to work with them and I will be a strong voice for getting commuter rail upgrades done.
@Bryan — Did this reporter, as you refer to him, also travel all the way from Western Mass to cover your campaign kickoff party?
What are you suggesting Jack?
Bryan, one of the issues you’ve been outspoken on is reducing or restricting tear downs. What would you specifically propose doing to reduce tear downs and what do you think the result will be?
@Jack – As it happens, the reporter did email me to ask if my event was open to the press and if he could do a short interview while there. That is exactly what happened.
@Kyle – Yes, I am not a fan of tear downs, particularly when they are replaced with larger square footage without creating additional units. In the face of global climate change and a regional housing crisis, we should be incentivizing more, smaller units, not less, larger units.
Basically, we need zoning reform that aligns the dimensional requirements and incentives towards our policy goals. If you don’t like the current trajectory of tear downs, then you don’t like the current zoning. The current zoning is what allows this all to happen. I was really glad to see that part of the zoning reform process is the creation of a tear down risk index and that the early efforts have tried to lower the number of units at risk of tear downs. I think that is the right approach, but we have to do our due diligence and then actually pass zoning reform for it to have an effect.
@Bryan: Too bad you weren’t on my side when I proposed the temporary moratorium so we could have more quickly addressed the zoning that makes it possible to build McMansions.
I don’t support moratoriums. Do the hard work to get permanent zoning reform done.
What about a house that’s falling apart or has a cracked foundation? We see that in Newton. Preventing that house from being revitalized because you can’t muster the political will to reform the zoning is a mistake.
But without a timeline – nothing gets done. So my moratorium proposal was in 2014? What’s been done since then to address this issue?
@Bryan: So I guess you were also against the attempted moratorium of preventing nomination of structures for local landmarking?
Amy, did you moratorium have an end date? Or was it in place until new zoning? If it had an end date, it would have been waited out. If it had no end date, you were effectively holding seller’s hostage.
I think the moratorium for historic structures/landmarks is baked into our system. It is also for a set time, and then it ends. I could argue the effectiveness, but it is a set period of one year, and owners can plan around it.
Zoning reform is a difficult lift for any community. It routinely takes years. Did you expect it to take a few months based on the moratorium? What makes you think that would be the result?
Finally, I recall a meeting in 2014 on your proposal. It didn’t get anywhere close to the votes needed. And from my recollection, it also halted additions of any significant size on smaller lots.
I think teardown moratoriums sound like a solution, but with a huge percentage of Newton homes already being non-confirming, there are a lot of unintended consequences, with uncertain benefit. And folks who need to monitize or expand their properties would have gotten stuck in the middle.
It is bad policy in my view. But fundamentally, if you can’t gather 2/3 of the council to get zoning reform done, what made you think you could get 2/3rds of your fellow councilors to support the moratorium?
I think a better solution would be to encourage the switch to zoning reform only needing majority rule, and then actually reforming the zoning code.
You are right that it has taken forever to even get to this point. But I disagree that your moratorium would have led to the reform you sought. Other communities have tried it, and lifted the moratorium shortly thereafter. The folks harmed by it tend to be very vocal.
@fig: my moratorium was proposed as temporary. I left it open for my fellow city councilors to help set the end date. 3 months? Six months? Please remind me what was proposed fir the moratorium on local land taking? Was there a timeframe proposed?
You suggest the proposal halted additions – can you provide specifuc examples or are you just hypothesizing that it might have?
Can you please provide the communities that have proposed similar moratoriums that failed to address specific zoning measures prompting the proposal of moratoriums or are you just making that presumption?
@Fignewtonville: I grudgingly am forced to admit you are a consummate dissembler. Partly why I asked for whom you work and where ;)
Pat:
I would consider that an insult actually. “Dissembler: One who dissembles; one who conceals his opinions, character, etc., under a false appearance; one who pretends that a thing which is is not.”
Well, you can’t please all the people all the time I guess, Pat. Feel free to ignore my comments if you’d like. Life will go on for both of us…
Amy, let me respond in full in the next post.
Amy, I couldn’t remember all the details of your proposal from 5 years ago, so I went to wayback machine to try and find a source. Here is what I found. Pretty sure it supports my position that it would have limited additions, because it says it directly. It is from the Globe article, written at the time. I’ll quote it in part and include a bigger portion below.
“The tone of the discussion was polite as 47 residents took three-minute turns to give their views on the proposal, which would put a temporary halt to permits for razing single- and two-family homes in certain circumstances.
The measure would prevent the full or partial demolition of homes where a replacement structure more than 20 percent larger than the original is planned, meaning most additions would also be paused.”
“Newton residents pack hearing on teardown moratorium
By Ellen Ishkanian Globe CorrespondentOctober 19, 2014, 12:00 a.m.
Residents divided over a proposed moratorium on tear-downs spent more than three hours Wednesday night debating whether the move is needed to save the city’s character, or would simply cause unnecessary financial hardship for those who can least afford it.
More than 200 people packed the Board of Aldermen’s Zoning and Planning Committee meeting, a turnout that chairwoman Marcia Johnson said she has seen exceeded only in the early 2000s, when off-leash dog areas were on the agenda. Interest in the topic prompted to panel to hold its hearing in the board’s main chamber in City Hall.
The tone of the discussion was polite as 47 residents took three-minute turns to give their views on the proposal, which would put a temporary halt to permits for razing single- and two-family homes in certain circumstances.
The measure would prevent the full or partial demolition of homes where a replacement structure more than 20 percent larger than the original is planned, meaning most additions would also be paused. The proposed moratorium would expire no later than Dec. 31, 2015.
The moratorium’s sponsor, Alderwoman Amy Mah Sangiolo, said the measure is needed to force changes in a zoning code that allows smaller homes to be replaced by homes two and three times bigger, or multifamily dwellings, changing the character of neighborhoods, killing trees, and reducing the number of moderately priced properties in the city.
“Maybe a moratorium is a drastic move,” Sangiolo said, “but something needs to be done, and that’s what I’m trying to accomplish.”
She has proposed a number of specific zoning changes that she says could be passed immediately to solve several issues.
Alderwoman Deborah Crossley said she thinks the moratorium is the wrong approach.
“It is a careless reaction to the work we must do to plan responsibly for Newton’s future,” she said.”
Amy, I think the last post is proof that I didn’t just “hypothesize” the effect on the additions, it made it into the actual news article in the Globe. And my recollection is that is what concerned me at the time, since my house is small and might be a candidate for an addition on a small lot. Like I said, I get why you wanted this proposal, but it had some collateral damage if it passed, and my ability to grow my house and not move away from Newton would have been part of that. That wasn’t a hypothesis, that was real life for me and my family.
As for the communities that tried this and pulled back, check out the link below:
http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis-city-council-lifts-teardown-moratorium/254913041/
That’s just one example from the intertubes/google. But pretty much exactly on point I think. But generally I think that moratoriums don’t get passed. The same thing that makes it difficult to build large multifamily buildings (due to zoning changes needing greater than majority approval) makes it hard to pass moratoriums. Some communities have done it, but I think I’ve seen it more often in cities with much greater poverty levels worried about gentrification and displacement, rather than places like Newton.
Look, we can certainly go back and forth on this, but it didn’t pass. And wouldn’t pass now. Why do you think that is?
At least you were trying to do something about the problem. Do you think it would pass now? I don’t. Do you?
You certainly know far more about this than I do, since it was your proposal. You were the expert in this, not me. I just found a few news articles to buttress my personal recollections, and I’m sure you lived all this in your role as city counciler. But I note that your last post was more questions than responses. Be careful, Pat might call you a dissembler… ;-)
@Amy – can I clarify – do you support zoning reform? It sounds like you do from those quotes, but I haven’t heard from you about the more recent zoning reform proposals. They generally align with what you were hoping to achieve.
@Fignewtonville: you have yet to answer my question. Speaking of Amy, it’s never a secret where she’s coming from. And she’s always on the side of the rest of us.
@Fig:Thanks for the walk down memory lane. The point of the moratorium was to force the City to move quickly on certain zoning reform measures to prevent the continued overbuilding of lots. Did I ever think it was going to pass? Of course not. But I had hoped by making the proposal, it would accomplish two things: 1) recognize there is a problem and 2) do something about it. So I find it amusing when folks are now taking an interest about the problem with teardowns and what is rebuilt in its place when that problem was raised 5 years ago and they were silent if not opposed to doing anything about it at the time.
So back to my questions:
@Bryan@Fig: Were or are you in favor of the proposed moratorium to prevent nominations of property for local landmarking?
@Fig: The moratorium proposal was for full or partial demolitions where the rebuild would be greater than 20% of the original. But since the proposal didn’t pass, it didn’t halt any additions.
@Fig: You said: “Other communities have tried it, and lifted the moratorium shortly thereafter.” Which communities and what were the moratoriums for?
@Bryan: There are many components in the proposed zoning that I support and others that I do not.
In the West Newton area I’m predominantly seeing single family homes zoned MR1 razed and two family homes being built. Those are adding an additional unit of housing, albeit often expensive but additional.
What specific change would you make to prevent tear downs but also allow existing homeowners to expand and additional units to be built? Increasing setbacks and lowering FAR will only serve to inhibit density and limit new housing and therefor support increased prices.
The projects being done in West Newton would probably have gone forward as significantly more expensive single family homes if zoning didn’t allow two family construction. The homes were very small and in poor condition, certainly not good candidates for renovations.
I’m not sure how you can support density in town centers and be against density elsewhere in the town.
@Amy, it sounds as if you prefer the passive-aggressive approach here. You sponsored a bill that by your own admission you knew wouldn’t pass and that wouldn’t address the problem over the long term without defining an alternative. Now you are asking those who express skepticism to help with your due diligence in describing the bill and other places that have gone this route. I have to wonder if you’re interested in finding a real solution, or in showing up your opponents?
@Ted: Huh? I stated that I knew the moratorium wouldn’t pass but I never stated that it wouldn’t address the problem over the long term. I proposed several specific zoning ordinances that would have and should have been passed that would address the issue of the overbuilds. I was asking Fig to be specific about communities he said that have gone tried moratoriums but pulled them back. I am truly interested in learning what those moratoriums were hoping to accomplish and what they did in response. He brought them up – not me.
Amy, I gave you the link above to the one from Minnesota. It might not have hyperlinked. But you can cut and paste it. I’ll respond more later to your questions. Just a busy morning.
Pat, in previous years when I revealed too much about myself a few zealous folks tried to dox me, tried calling around to find my workplace and generally got personal. Occasionally things get heated on the blog. I think those days have passed but I decided to keep posting under this handle, mostly for my family and spouse. Greg and Jerry have my email and I met and talked to Dan Fahey in person, may he Rest In Peace. I miss Dan Fahey a lot actually, he was the best of us.
Ok back to work.
@Fig: Sorry – I hadn’t seen that post. I found the link to Minnesota. Thank you.
No worries, probably my fault for the lengthy posts I write. I’m sure there is a way to format my posts differently, but I’m not great at the tech stuff of blogging, so I hide it with more words.
It always amazed me that the then Alderman couldn’t get a 2/3 majority to say “gee, Scott has a 7400 sf lot and a 2,100 sf house. Maybe an FAR of .47 (3478 ) with a .02 bonus, might encourage a teardown. Maybe, just maybe we should drop the FARs and increase the rear setbacks, and make the oversized house on a small lot subject to a special permit” Problem solved.
@amy – to answer your question from WAY up above…the moratorium or “temporary suspension” on landmarking was capped off at 18 months. They wanted to make sure they had enough time to review and amend the ordinance…