Select Board Will Not Support Funds For Chatham Housing

 HARWICH – While the community preservation committee is recommending town meeting approve $100,000 in Community Preservation Act funds for each of the two Pennrose LLC affordable housing projects in neighboring Chatham, the select board and finance committee have voted to recommend indefinite postponement of the two articles.

 “I thought we were focusing on the regional need for housing and what we could do to help that, the big picture,” Community Preservation Committee (CPC) member Kathy Green said in a meeting in March, after the select board voted 5 to 0 to recommend to town meeting not to fund the two articles for affordable housing in Chatham. 

Green went on to say that Select Board Chair Donald Howell stated in the board’s meeting that Harwich hasn’t seen a dime from Orleans so why continue to support other towns; which Green said, “I thought was unfair and unrealistic. It was almost like tit for tat, which was not really the approach that I think this committee was taking.”

The minutes of the select board’s March 9 session state: “Mr. Howell noted that Harwich has not seen any money from Orleans as a result of us voting to give them funds to support their Pennrose project a couple of years ago. While he supports affordable housing, Mr. Howell is not sure that something outside Harwich helps us.”

The minutes go on to state: “Mr. Piekarski noted that the Chatham Select Board did not vote to support this from their own Community Preservation Act (CPA) funds.”

Select Board member Jeffrey Handler put forward motions in the March 9 meeting to support the two articles, each one was denied by the board by a 5 to 0 vote.

Harwich voters did approve the use of $100,000 in CPA funds for the 62-unit Pennrose mixed income housing project at the former Cape Cod 5 headquarters in Orleans. Harwich was one of five towns, also including Chatham, Eastham, Wellfleet and Truro, that committed a total of $500,000 to the Orleans project.

However Michael Herman, the select board’s representative to the Orleans CPC, told that committee on Feb. 11 that as more towns have begun working on their own projects, there’s less of a need for towns to support projects in other communities with their CPA funds. The community preservation committee in Orleans rejected funding both the Main Street and Meetinghouse Road developments in Chatham.
 Jeffrey Dykens of the Chatham select board was critical of Orleans’ decision against supporting the 48 units planned for Main Street and an additional 42 units planned for Meetinghouse Road, calling the decision “appalling.” 
 Pennrose filed applications in Harwich for $100,000 from the community housing category for each of the two developments in Chatham. The Harwich CPC voted in mid-February to recommend that town meeting fund those requests.
 However, Chatham select board Chair Dean Nicastro has noted that the land disposition agreements the town has with Pennrose for both properties do not commit the town to providing additional funding. The Chatham select board voted 3 to 2 not to support a town meeting request for Community Preservation Act funds for the two affordable housing projects being developed by Pennrose.
 As for the Harwich board’s votes not to support the CPC recommendations on the Chatham projects, CPC member Mary Maslowski said; “Since I’ve been on the board, this is the first time that they (select board) haven’t taken our deliberations under consideration … and it’s disappointing that we do the work at the meetings and ask the questions and make decisions based on the funds available, and it seems like these discussions were disregarded this time around.”
 “The committee has done a pretty good job of thoughtfully considering the applications in front of us and not just rubber stamping them,” Maslowski said.
 Green said these articles will remain in the warrant and be presented to voters in town meeting, they just won’t be supported by the board. As for the finance committee recommendations to indefinitely postpone the articles, the committee’s explanation states at the time of the vote there were questions as to the legality and status of the articles.

.