Bellicose Bumpkin

Winding it’s way through the musty halls of the state house is an act to improve CPA. All three of Middleboro’s state reps signed on as co-sponsors – That’s Thomas Calter, Stephen Canessa, and William Strauss. Middleboro’s state senator – Marc Pacheco did not sign on as a co-sponsor(boo hiss). I had sent letters to all of them urging them to do so. Here is the full text of a letter I sent to Middleboro’s town manager and BOS – asking them to contact our delegation:

Greetings,

Now that Middleboro has adopted CPA, I urge the Middleboro
Board of Selectmen and Town Manager to contact our state
delegation and ask them to sign on as cosponsors of
legislation that has been filed to improve CPA.  The Act To
Sustain Community Preservation has just been re-filed for
the 2011 session.  Note that even if they were co-sponsors
last year - and most/all of them were - they have to sign
up again for the re-filed bill.

State Senate: Docket # 82, An Act to Sustain Community
Preservation, Senator Cynthia Stone Creem

State House of Representatives: Docket # 474, An Act to
Sustain Community Preservation, Representative Stephen Kulik

The full bill can be seen here - http://bit.ly/fXNd8P
A summary is here - http://bit.ly/fP5Hh2
The high points are:
 1. Would fix the state match at 75%.  This would more than
    double the state match that is predicted for the next
    few years.

 2. Allow towns who are contributing 1% (like us) to combine
    another 2% from other sources if they wish.

 3. Allow CPA money to be used for existing parks and
    recreational resources.  Currently CPA can only be used
    to create such facilities or maintain ones that were
    created by CPA.

Please CC me on any correspondence with our state delegation
on this matter if possible.

I was interviewed for this story about the difficulty implementing CPA. The ballot that just passed adopting CPA specifies that collection of the surcharge starts in FY2011 – this year. Trouble is that the tax bills already went out and town doesn’t know how to implement it. It might require some changes to the town’s tax billing software and possibly a separate mailing for the fee. The DOR has told the town they could delay implementation but warned that CPA supporters could sue the town to force the collection.

If you read the article, you might be left thinking that CPA supporters are on the verge of launching such a lawsuit. Not so. From the article:

What got left on the editing room floor was that I also said that I wouldn’t support a lawsuit against the town. I spoke to town manager Cristello yesterday on something related to CPA and we discussed this very issue. I told Charlie that with my CPA hat on, the CPA fund would be taking quite a hit if the town doesn’t get the bill out this year. On the other hand, I told him that a lawsuit was a terrible idea that would get CPA off on the wrong foot

So I expect the town to make all effort to collect the fee this year but will wait until next year if it can’t get done. The only person talking about a lawsuit is somebody floating theoreticals at the DOR.

Please get out there today and vote for CPA – even if you have no interest in any other candidate or ballot question

Little known pond near St. Mary's Cemetery

This week’s Gazette column is basically an endorsement for the The Community Preservation Act and I urge you to vote YES ON QUESTION FIVE.
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The group advocating for passage of CPA have set up a web site – PreserveMiddleborough.org. Technically I donated the effort and web space for the site at their direction – in case that distinction matters to anyone.

Back in the October 2009 town meeting, Article 14 was approved that provided $60K along with a previously approved $40K for the purchase of a large chunk of land near Assawompsett and the Black Brook Conservation Area.

I won’t take the shine off this good news by pointing out that our $100K investment would have been more like a $50K investment if we were participating in the CPA – the best no-brainer planning tool available. Oops,,, just did. As reported in this Enterprise article:

Kudos to Ruth and everyone who worked to put this together.

I have to get out to this area and see what sort of trails there are.

From Wareham:

Wareham spent $320K on 20 acres of land that provides access to another 300 acrees on Buzzard’s Bay. That $320K, will was matched at probably 90% by state funds, resulted in $3 million in land. That’s a return of nearly $20 on the dollar. Even with no state matching – that’s still a return of $10 on the dollar.

CPA is smart money.

Looks like some other people in town are talking about CPA.

I will say that back in 2002, it didn’t get defeated by that much. I had heard that it lost by like 2-1. Clearly not so.

Personally I think that waiting for the economy to be better is sort of like a dog chasing it’s tail. It will make the pill easier to swallow, but there’s is no guarantee that the economy won’t turn down in the year between the time CPA is passed and the time when the first tax surcharge comes in.

Still, if it makes people feel better then so be it.

So I see this article on some CPA expenditures in Easton that were recently approved at town meeting:

Almost $670K spent at one town meeting on historic preservation projects.

Imagine trying to get all that to fly at a Middleboro town meeting? Without a program like CPA, opportunities like these slip past and the town is left patting itself on the back for the kneejerk responses and crisis management that passes for preservation in this town.

A recent post about an upcoming employment seminar devolved into a discussion of the Community Preservation Act a law that benefits towns interested in preserving their communities.

Today’s Patriot Ledger had an article that covered an interesting use of CPA for affordable housing. Too often people look at CPA only as a tool to preserve open space. It can also be used for affordable housing, historic preservation, and recreational assets. Back to point. Randolph is using CPA money to give out loans to buy houses. This money is intended for people that otherwise might not be able to secure financing to purchase their own home.

What a great program. Lower income people benefit. Distressed properties are prevented from becoming blighted. The community as a whole benefits.

Great idea.

People in a similar condition in Middleboro can take comfort in the fact that they won’t be able to buy a house at all and so won’t be saddled with that $24 CPA surcharge.

This weeks Gazette is full of interesting articles and letters to the editor.

Bumpkin’s Corner – my bi-weekly column gives an overdue update on the CPA effort. That alone is worth the price of the paper, at least to my mom.

Word on Carcier v. Kempthorne/Salazar) came in at the 11th hour leaving editor Jane Lopes just enough time to opine that the already slim chances for a Middleboro casino have become much slimmer.

A great letter from former CFO president Jacquie Tolosko pointing out that the myopic BOS might do with some reading glasses so they can see the impacts and realities that have been pointed out repeatedly by casino opponents for almost 2 years now.

Another great letter from Mike Solomini about the Middleboro BOS’s reluctance to follow open meeting law. At the last BOS meeting, Mr. Solomini asked the BOS to amend meeting minutes to include the germane content of a discussion about the BOS’s connections with the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, it’s investors/handlers, and gifts they had received. Spataro and to a lesser degree Brunelle, put on a quite a display that fortunately has been immortalized in a video that will be posted soon.

The Gazette is still only 50 cents and this week’s issue would be a bargain at twice that price.

I received this email and put it out there for discussion. Historic preservation easements sound like an interesting option.

The Massachusetts Historical Commission is accepting applications for grants. This would be the perfect thing to use CPA for. The Massachusetts Preservation Projects fund gives you a 50% match for historical preservation. If we were in CPA, we could spend some CPA funds on these sorts of projects. The net result would be that we would receive 3 dollars for every 1 dollar we invested.

Look at the numbers. Imagine a theoretical $200K project to restore some historic building. Further imagine that we fund the project with CPA money and this historic grant and assuma a 50% CPA match.

Total cost: $200K
Historic matching: $100K
Middleboro contribution: $67K
CPA matching funds: $33K

End result – we get $200K worth of historic preservation for $67K. That’s nearly a 300% return.

Now let’s get back to reality. Without CPA, most likely we will never spend any money on this historic project, we will not receive the matching CPA funds, and we won’t get any money from this historic grant project.

If you’re not in, you can’t win. If we don’t adopt CPA … we’re not in.

Here is a quote from the Massachusetts Preservation Projects fund web page.

The next CPA meeting will be at the Middleboro Library, 6:30 to 8:00 PM
on Tuesday, January 6th.

The first part of the meeting will be informational for anyone with
questions about CPA followed by a larger organizational segment.

Please come one and all – even if just to stop by and say “Bumpkin,
you rock!” or to hurl tomatoes and/or insults from the back of the
room.

http://cpanow.org

A summary of last night’s CPA meeting can be seen on the CPA Now web site.

I have to say that I’m very excited by the turnout and I’m not talking about the sheer quantity of people – which was pretty darn respectable. It was the type of people who were there.

With the Marshall indictment, our old friend the casino issue is rearing it’s ugly head again and no doubt things will heat up in the coming days. There was a tremendous cross section of people from very pro, to very anti, to people who didn’t give rat’s behind. There were older townie types, new residents, people from town governemnt, citizen activist types. There were people who have feuded pretty publicly over the last year and a half. Right up front was a Wampanaog trbal member. Nearby was Brian Giovanoni – who has excellent knowledge of CPA and apparently worked to pass it in Duxbury. There were some people who have done some pretty good skewering of me on the Internet and some people who have had their own battles on the ‘net.

This was the very first time since the “C” came, that I really felt that there was hope for the town to come together and work together on something without a cloud hanging over everything.

I want to personally thank everyone that came.

Middleboro Library – large meeting room(downstairs)
Tuesday, December 16
6:30 P.M. to 8:30 P.M

The Enterprise has an article about pros and antis working together on CPA.

That pretty much says it all. CPA is a pure effort that has nothing to do with the wars of the past.

The current Gazette also has an article about this effort:

For the last year, I’ve been looking at CPA, the Community Preservation Act and am convinced that this is a great program that Middleborough should be taking advantage of. CPA is described in some detail here:
http://cpanow.org

In short – it is a way for Middleborough to raise money, that is partially or fully matched by the state, for preserving open space, historical treasures, provide housing, enhance recreational offering, and otherwise improve our community.

Myself and a number of other Middleborough citizens – pro casino, anti casino, town employees, citizens, are looking to get CPA on the ballot at the spring town election. This will require nearly 1,000 signatures – which must be collected by early February.

To that end, we are looking to hold informational meetings, answer questions and find others who are willing to help. The first meeting will take place this Tuesday:
Tuesday December 16, 2008 – 6:30 PM
in the Middleboro Library – downstairs.

Passing CPA will not be done with a few emails or a web site. It will require people. Please join us on Tuesday evening. With all the turmoil and division Middleboro has seen in the last year or so, this is an effort that will require all and an effort that has one simple goal: To preserve, protect, and improve our community.

Until the meeting, I would ask you to collect email addresses and phone numbers of people you know – your universe, and get them in a state where you can contact them to ask for their support.

Regards and please feel free to contact me anytime if you have any questions.

-Mark

I asked for and was granted a spot on the Middleboro FinCom agenda last night – Monday 12/8/2008. I gave a short presentation on CPA which can be seen here. Click in the page to advance from slide to slide.

The presentation is quite brief and lacking much detail without commentary.

I kept it as brief as I could, the committee showed interest and even bumped me up on the agenda so I could get out early. It is a real pleasure dealing with this group of professionals and I find them highly approachable. FinCom is a resource that Middleboro should be taking more advantage of and I would encourage everyone to pay attention to and support this committee. Without going off on a tangent, I really would like to see the expertise of FinCom leveraged more than it is. But I digress.

I wanted the opportunity to explain CPA to them and appeal for their individual support if not the support of the committee. Regardless of whether FinCom supports the idea of CPA, or if any of its members support it as individuals, I asked to be heard … and I was.

And I can’t ask for any more than that.

I was about to start running some real numbers on what the average Middleboro household would pay if we adopted CPA. Fortunately, I didn’t have to. I contacted a person from Community Preservation Coalition who sent me this projection based on FY2008 tax receipts.

To remind you – CPA would allow us to have a surcharge of 1-3% on our property tax bills. This money would be matched by the state up to 100% but more likely somewhere around 70-75%. These monies can be used for open space preservation, historical preservation, affordable housing, and recreational spending. In the next legislative session, there will be a bill to increase the minimun state match from 5% to 75%. Where else can you get a 75% return on your money?

The first $100K of property value is exempt and there are low income exceptions as well. These numbers are based on FY08 tax figures, using a residential tax rate of $10.10 per thousand and and the average single family home’s assessed value of $326,403 reduced to $226,403 with the $100K exemption. The brings the average tax payment down to $2,286.67.

Here are the expected payments, matching state funds, and totals based on these numbers:

CPA % – Amount of CPA surcharge
Avg payment – Average payment per house per year
Town total – Total raised by the town
State match – Amount given by the state (based on 75% match)
Total with 75% match – Total CPA funds raised by Middleboro with state matching funds

So – if Middleboro opts into CPA at the maximum amount of 3%, the average home will pay $68.60 per year or just $1.32 per week. This will raise $595K per year and bring in $446K of free state matching money for a total of just over $1M dollars per year to preserve open space, prevent unwanted development, preserve our history, and pursue affordable housing.

The Globe reports on closer scrutiny of CPA spending:

This is clearly unfair to towns with little open space to create new recreational facilities and little money to maintain existing ones. Just look at Middleboro’s chronically underfunded Parks Department. While we have space for more stuff, we’re struggling to take care of the stuff we have. CPA could help alleviate that.

One of the digs on CPA comes from people who just don’t like state programs. They rightly point out that the state can change the rules – which is true to an extent. As more communities opted in to CPA, and the economy worsened, the matching funds dropped from 100% down to around 70%. There is talk of a bill to fix the minimum match at 70% – which would be a great thing. While the court has ruled that you cannot use CPA monies for existing recreational space, there is a bill to allow CPA spending for that purpose:

Even if the bill doesn’t make it this time around, CPA should evolve to be more community-friendly as more and more towns opt in and run into things like this.

It’s still free money that allows for better planning of expenditures that we are(or should) be spending anyway.

I’ve been watching the CPA campaign in Gloucester and am pleased to see that it passed.

Coming up to this vote, there were many letters in Gloucester local papers some inf favor and some against. In these hard economic times, the easy thing to do is vote to keep a few more bucks in your pocket. Often however, the easy thing is not the right thing. Gloucester voters made the right choice and I hope Middleboro voters do the same when it’s their turn.

Looks like CPA funds will be matched at 70% next year. Meaning that a town that has adopted CPA will get $7 for every $10 they contribute.

Free money.

There is a bill in the pipeline that would establish a minimum match of 75%.

My next Gazette column will be out tomorrow and deals with CPA.

This article came in via a Google alert and contains this tantalizing statement:

Short version – Marion used their CPA money to create desireable affordable housing for seniors, got a whole bunch of extra funding, and is cranking up the number of affordable housing units – which in turn protects them against unwanted 40B development.

Meanwhile Middeleboro continues with it’s crisis-of-the-day style of dealing with affordable housing, open space, and other issues that CPA would help us bring under control.

Here is a nice example of CPA funds being used to block unwanted development:

I’ve just started writing a Gazette article about CPA so feel free to comment if you have any input.

Another in my ongoing series to scope out CPA – the Community Preservation Act. Initially I read the available information and for several months I’ve been seeing what shows up in a google alert. The idea is see all news about CPA – the good, the bad, and the ugly.

This article makes an interesting point about affordable housing – which is one of the three things CPA money can be used for. It is in the town’s best interests to have enough affordable housing to prevent relatively uncontrolled 40B housing.

I’m trying to see the downside here folks and just can’t.