Grumpytown Forever Stuck in Mud

We have before us (as the Moderator would say) another reason to do some self-reflection.  Not only did Billerica Town Meeting pass on the opportunity to improve its own center — at a private land-owner’s expense, no less — it also looked small business owners squarely in the eye and spit in their faces.

I guess some members of our town’s venerable leadership group don’t realize that the region is watching us, particularly the business community.  They see that the owners of 5 Andover Road hired an attorney, surveyor, and an architect — at considerable expense, I’m sure — only to have their plans torn up by a Billerica’s paranoid governing body.  Zero return on their investment.  We are becoming the Chernobyl of the Merrimack Valley business landscape.

Now for the sickening irony.  The owners of 5 Andover Road could used the dreaded 40B law — which opponents used as part of their argument against the overlay district — to build their residential units after all.

Discuss.

Back to the May 8 meeting.  It’s not so much the result that bothers me so much.  It’s the way TMRs arrived at their decisions. To wit:

• Many expressed strong support for mixed use in concept but spoke against the article.  These people don’t like the article as written, but offer no amendments and show no interest in working on a compromise article.
• Facts that clash with beliefs and fears about the article were rejected out of hand.  The proponent supplied a three-page FAQ to TM before the meeting started, but did people read it?  When no one is even open to a rational conversation, where does that leave the proponent?

Town Meeting is an obstructionist, immovable object.  No form of progress can puncture it so long as a two-thirds vote is required.  Obstructionist TMRs cannot be removed by the voters, because no one will challenge them for their seats and even if there were, there aren’t enough voters to oust the buffoons.

And forget mixed use for a second.  Anything of consequence that we want has to pass through TM, too.  Take the bike path.  The committee is working their asses off trying to get abutters along the path corridor to sign on.  But when it gets to the TM floor, the obstructionists will say “finish the sewer first” and that will be the end of it.  Quality of life means nothing whatsoever to this voting bloc.

What to do?  Brainstorm time:

• Get new people to run for TM.  Problem: already tried that.  This year with all 240 TM opened up after redistricting, every seat was there for the taking.  But just 203 people stepped forward.  TM is a product that is nearly impossible to sell.
• Put the mixed use question on the ballot.  Problem: It’s not clear this is legal.
• Got after TM itself by slashing the number of seats.  Problem:  Good luck.  Expecting TMRs to risk losing their own seat in an election will be harder than asking Congress to pass on a pay raise for themselves.  Reading TM last week rejected an article that would have reduced its size from 192 to 144 seats.  The vote: Six in favor, 121 opposed.  Ouch.
• Put together an education campaign.  Problem: Education only works on people who want to learn, and the obstructionists are not interested.

Town Meeting is hopeless.  I hate to say that — honestly, I do — because there are dozens of good people in this town who want to govern, are good at it, and put in a tremendous amount of time into it.  Start with the Finance Committee, the hardest-working group in town.  But what good is a top-notch FinCom if TM never takes their advice?

I’ve written before that no government can excel unless the people in it trust each other.  (It would also help if the voters trusted the government, but I think we’re losing that battle a little more every day.)  Aside from the budget, TM has almost no trust in the Finance Committee, which voted 10-1 to recommend Article 31.  It certainly doesn’t trust the Planning Board (6-0), despite member David Kinsella assuring the crowd that he would be very tough with all proposals coming to him.  And there is some trust with BOS (3-2) members (particularly Mike Rosa, who delivered the minority report), but even if the BOS had voted 5-0 to recommend, I still don’t think you would get 120 Yes votes.

So where does that leave us?  Mired in the backwater.  We have left the business community no with no tools and little incentive to improve their properties.  Every year, properties are going to get older and older, and little by little, businesses are going to decline to renew their leases in favor of updated spaces in neighboring towns.  That leads to a drop in commercial property values.

What is the effect of declining property values?  Someone has to make up the difference in a budget that’s climbing by a few percentage points every year.  And who might that be?

Why, you of course, the residential property taxpayer.

Enjoy.

One in Six Town Meeting Seats Empty

After last night’s precinct caucuses, just one precinct — #6 — filled empty seats, for of them. That leaves 38 seats empty going into Spring Town Meeting.

Still think 240 seats is just the right amount?

Your Bill for Three Wars

While GOP candidates snipe over moon colonies, a gaping hole in our economy is the price that we will pay for war.  According to the Wall Street Journal, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan are costing us around $4 trillion.  And we are borrowing this money, of course, so you can tack on future interest costs to that.

A million dollars isn’t a lot of money any more, but $4 trillion still is.  Here is what that looks like:

$4,000,000,000,000

Or, divided by 110,000,000 American households, your family’s share is $36,300. For starters.

Maybe that puts your $4500 property bill in perspective.

Can’t Buy Me Love

The mob bowls over women at a Walmart on Black Friday

Black Friday: it’s a phase as commonplace in America now as “White Christmas” was in George Bailey’s day.  A day to revel in everything this great country to offer, and, more importantly, to save a ton of money on it.  It’s also a day to punch, tackle, push, and otherwise injure your opponent — and I’m not talking about football.

As recently as ten years ago, Black Friday was a day that Americans traditionally (and quietly) started their Christmas shopping.  Many people were still visiting family and maybe wanted to get out of the house after spending hours the day before preparing and cleaning up a feast.  It was all very nice — spending time with loved ones, choosing gifts to give, watching a movie, taking a picture of the kids with Santa, and so on.

But then a few years ago, the retail industry started getting desperate for holiday dollars.  When recession spending dipped, they turned up the dials on marketing and promotion.  They started opening earlier than the other guys to get a jump on the competition.  Dawn.  Six AM.  Four.  Then three and two o’clock in the morning.  And this year, midnight “doorbusters.”

And at Walmart, open at 10 PM on Thanksgiving Day.  Doorbuster indeed.  In 2008, a Long Island Walmart staff member was trampled to death as the rabid crowd surged into the building after the glass portal slid open.  The death caused Walmart and other big boxers to spend thousands on crown control plans and police details.

This year, the number of violent incidents grew.  In California, a woman pepper sprayed other shoppers so that she could get an Xbox first.  Twenty people were hurt.  On YouTube you can enjoy videos of human beings brawling over towels priced at $1.88 and waffle irons at $2.  In another you’ll see people tearing open boxes of discounted cell phones like hyenas.  And in Manhattan of all places, customers broke windows of a Hollister store and stole items because it was not open as early as some other franchise stores.  Add a stabbing here and a shooting there, and what you have is a Black Friday experience that not even Walmart execs can spin.

(This is not to pick on Walmart.  Not all of these incidences occurred in its stores.  But it’s hard to deny that Walmart tends to attract this kind of behavior, no?)

OK, most Black Fridays sales were peaceful.  True.  Let’s look at one reporter’s story of local doorbuster events.  One of the shoppers interviewed arrived at the Cambridge Best Buy at 3:30 PM for a sale on a TV , waited 10 hours in the cold — along with 1,500 other people — and finally at 1 AM she found that the televisions were all sold out.  She went on to two other stores before finding one.

My Black Friday prize goes to the two friends who showed up to Framingham Walmat at 8:30 AM (!) and were first in line for the 4 AM opening, some 20 hours later.  One of them saved $300, the equivalent getting paid $15 and hour.  “I’m doing it for my grandchildren,” she said.  I don’t know them, lady, but I’ll bet they would rather spend Thanksgiving Day with you.  (On the other hand, the Xbox you bought them is pretty cool.  At least you didn’t pepper spray anyone for it.)

Finally, a shopper told the reporter:

“I can’t afford it,’’ she said of buying gifts at regular prices. “I work in day care and I don’t have it.’’ To put presents under the tree this year, she’ll shop Walmart and Kmart exclusively. “I get paid twice a month and will have to wait till next month to shop again,’’ she said. Until then? “I pray.’’

Oh, that reminds me.  Christmas is day Christians celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus.  I almost forgot.

Even if you are not religious person, the holidays were once about spending time with family and friends.  Yes, that generally includes giving gifts.  But with so little free time in our lives, why do otherwise intelligent Americans give so much of it away to save a few dollars on electronics?

Nationwide, tens of thousands of people trawled bog box stores well before dawn.  What is it about shopping that has made it so important to us?  More important than family, for some.

Are shoppers forced into this madness because of the recession?  After all, as some people told reporters, they can’t afford this stuff at full price, and this is the only time during the entire year that they can afford it.  OK, except that these are luxury items, and we are not living in a luxury economy.  We are not entitled to big screen TVs in lean years, too.

But retail spending is good for the economy, you say.  It creates jobs.  Sure.  Seasonal jobs.  Second jobs — the sort of jobs people need to take because they are still paying for last Christmas.  Americans owe some $800 billion dollars to credit card companies, and they are paying around 15% interest on it.

It’s official:  Black Friday is completely out of control.  For a few days at the end of Thanksgiving week, the doom-and-gloom headlines are replaced by giddy reports of people spending money like mad.  After all the receipts were totaled, 226 million people spent $52.4 billion.  There are about 243 million people over age 15 in the United States.  Retail execs were frothing at the mouth in the papers, sniggering in their cavernous office suites.

Other countries are laughing at at us, or at least scratching their heads. Risk injury over a $2 waffle iron that will not last a year?  If that is not insanity, what is?

Having kids has changed my view of Christmas.  Kids love everything about Christmas.  Yes, they love getting presents.  But they also go gaga over decorations, lights on houses, seeing Santa Claus, singing carols, eating festive cookies, watching Christmas movies and reading Christmas books.  Having children this time of year is a real gift.  (Maybe if I do it right I can teach them a little about the joy of giving, too.)

Adults sparring over Cabbage Patch Dolls in the ’80s was pathetic, too. But at least deep down those loony parents wanted to make their kids happy.  But now, it’s not about the kids anymore.  It’s about collecting all the junk we can squeeze into our houses.

There is no better time of year to reflect on our values and our priorities as individuals, as communities, and as a country than during the holiday season.  And in a year that we had a hard time sacrificing (I’m looking at you, Supercommittee), this year’s Black Friday is not a good start.  I’ll start: less stuff, more time with the people we love.  Less quantity, more quality.  Less take, more give.

Going shopping for little while — during daylight hours — on the Friday after Thanksgiving?  That’s a Thanksgiving tradition right up there with football and pumpkin pie.  A human stampede at the local Walmart at 10pm Thursday?  We’re better than that.  Stay home and hug your kids.

Second Town Center Visioning Session On Tap

NMCOG has finally put together the second Town Center Visioning Session. The first meeting was in March. Session #2 is set for this Thursday, November 10, at 7pm in Town Hall. I hope to see you all there. If you can’t be there, check back here early next week for a summary of the meeting.

NMCOG has a page on their web site for the project: http://nmcog.org/BillericaTownCenterStudy.htm. You will find the notice for the current meetings and you can download a copy of the presentation of the first session there.

More on Net Worth and the Middle Class

Tony commented on A New Definition of Middle Class:

Very good article. This is the type of information that should be talk in high school so kids have the proper financial knowledge after they graduate. I see too many kids blowing their money on the toys and having nothing saved up when they want to buy a house.

The sad part is when both Mr. Black and Mr Brown’s kids apply for college money, who do you think will get more aid? Because the Black family did proper financial planning, unless the kids have excelled in academics, college aid will be minimal.

Tony made two excellent points:

Kids receive little, if any, training in personal finance

Very true.  I had zero instruction about money in high school and college.  Everything I know about managing my personal finances is self-taught, aside from an attitude of saving  and spending less than you earn, which I got from my parents.

A New Definition of Middle Class

We define what “class” we are in by how much money we make — that is, annual per capita income or household income.  But is this the true measure of how much money people have?

No.  It only reflects one half of the equation: How much is coming in.

When the recession comes, as we have seen over the past few years, it hits people hard.  Or does it?  Have some middle class families been completely unaffected by the recession?  How is that possible when every news outlet screams at us that unemployment is high, foreclosures are breaking records, banks aren’t lending, and businesses aren’t growing?  It’s because not all middle class families are alike.  In fact, some “middle class” families are dirt poor, despite appearances to the contrary.

That’s why middle class (or any class) should not be defined by income, but instead by net worth.

A household’s net worth is equal to the value of its assets (houses, cars, cash saving and investments, etc.) minus its liabilities (debt).  Net worth is a much better indicator of a family’s choices with regard to saving and spending.  Consider this example:

The Black family and the Brown family live across from one another.  They each bought 3-bedroom, 40-year-old Colonials on a half-acre of land 10 years ago for $300,000.  They each have 2 elementary school-age kids and 2 cars.  Both houses took a hit in value when the recession hit and each are worth $275,000.  Each of the four adults earns $50,000 per year.  Both families are firmly planted in the middle class, and would be devastated if one of the earners was laid off.  Right?

Maybe not.  While these families look identical, here’s what you don’t see.  The Black family has been saving for college and retirement since they bought their house.  They have a professional manage their other cash savings.  They own both cars, which are 8 and 9 years old.  They have been doing minor improvements on the interior and exterior of the house.  They take one vacation per year.  They make their own dinner on all but 1-2 days a month, mow their own lawn, shovel their own driveway, and clean the house themselves.  Five years ago they look advantage of low interest rates and refinanced, going from a 30-year to a 20-year fixed mortgage, even though their monthly payment went up by $80.  They carry no balance on credit cards.

The Browns have no college savings set up for their kids.  Their retirement plan counts entirely on a hefty inheritance from an uncle who they suspect is rich.  Mr. Brown gets lots of great stock tips from “a guy I know in the market” on companies that make consumer products and day-trades while watching the ball game on TV.  One car is leased and 2 years old.  The other is a 4-year-old $50,000 SUV.  They took out a home equity line for $50,000 to build a new kitchen with granite countertops and stainless steal appliances, which they mostly use to re-heat take-out.  They own a small “fixer-upper” vacation house on the lake.  They also have a fishing boat and trailer, a jet-ski, and a snowmobile.  They travel to Disney and Las Vegas annually, and this year they are going to Hawaii for 2 weeks.  They hire people to plow the driveway, maintain their lawn, and clean the house.   They have substantial credit card debt.

What do you suppose the net worth of each family is?  Let’s look:

For the Black family, their assets include the house, two cars, and lots of investments and savings.  Their debt is the mortgage on the house, on which they owe $225,000.  (The house will be paid off in 15 years.)  Their net worth: Likely approaching $100,000.

And for the Browns, their assets are the house, the SUV, the boat, the jet-ski, the vacation house, and the snowmobile.  Now subtract their debt.   The debt includes the mortgage and home equity loan (formerly known as a second mortgage), for which they owe  more than the house is now worth; the loan on the SUV (they are upside-down on that, too); the mortgage on the second house; the boat loan; and the credit card debt (which is how they financed the jet-ski, snowmobile, vacation, and the 52″ plasma TV, among many other things, at 18% interest.)  Mr. Brown hasn’t done so well day trading; in fact he has lost money.  Their net worth?  Negative.

What happens when Mr. Black and Mr. Brown are suddenly laid off?

For the Brown family, it’s obviously catastrophic.  Without savings, they live hand to mouth, which no middle-class family should have to do.  They could sell the SUV, but they would take a bath on it, plus be without one car, which they can’t do.  They could sell the vacation house, but they would have to put money into it in order to get any offers.  They could sell the boat, but the recession and fuel prices have hurt demand for boats.  They could sell the snowmobile or the jet-ski, but that cash won’t last very long.

But across the street, the Black family has, on the advice of their financial advisor, put a 6-month “rainy-day fund” into liquid savings just in case one of them was laid off.  This money will enable them to pay the bills until Mr. Brown finds a new job.  In the meantime, they will not be able to afford luxuries like a vacation or cable TV.

Meanwhile, the Brown family may have to foreclose on the vacation house, which will destroy their credit.  If Mr. Brown can’t find work soon, they might lose the main house, too.

In other words, two families who earn the exact same middle class income have completely different financial situations.  The Browns spent their moderate income on a multitude a luxuries — the SUV, a boat, a vacation house, a designer kitchen, and for professional services they could have done themselves.  As a result, they have put themselves into a very lower-class net worth.  They are poor, and recessions expose the truly poor.

This is the backstory that the press is missing when they report on the tragic combination of unemployment of home foreclosures.  Anytime a family is loses their home, it’s a sad story, especially when the reader or the viewer can relate to the “middle class” victims.

And that’s the point.  The “victims” are usually not middle class at all.  While they started with a middle-class income, they made upper-class purchases and landed with a thud in the lower-class — the net worth poor house.

We who are middle class must not forget that we are not rich.  We cannot really afford all that is offered to us, despite what car commercials and the home show want us to believe.  Strange that in the in the land of Thoreau (who built his house for less than $20) we continue to buy, buy, buy even when our purchasing power is less and less.  We moan about higher prices while forgetting how much our money can earn– with the right investments — while we laze on a lawn chair in the back yard.

True middle class living is the peace of mind that comes with knowing that we can survive an economic downturn (whether personal or or global) with minimal suffering.  It is not the frantic and relentless collection of shiny things.

Town Meeting to Dissect Budget Tonight

Session number two of Town Meeting will be tonight, and we will most likely debate just one article: #4, the budget.

Here is how it works:  On the first night, the Moderator reads six pages worth of budget line items, about 240 in all.  Any TM representative can place a “hold” on the item.  At the end of the first night, TM votes to accept the budget lines not held.  In the second session, the TMRs who held lines will have the opportunity to ask staff questions about them.  Then a debate and then a vote on each item.

There were 49 lines held this year.

Last year, 42 lines were held and a grand total of zero changes were made to the budget.  The few motions made to reduce lines were all defeated in 2010.

We’ll see tonight if TM makes any actual changes to the budget.  I want to recognize the Finance Committee for all the time, attention, and care the volunteer members took to write this budget.  They, along with the Town Manager and his staff, spend hundreds of hours on it and I feel it is very good.

Most of the 42 “holds” in 2010 were passed, meaning the TMR placing the hold decided not to ask any questions after all.

As was the case last year, almost all holds were put in by just a handful of TMRs.

I held one item, town interest on debt service.

I should also point out that the Town Manager and the Director of Business Operations for the School Department each did an outstanding job presenting the town and school side budgets.  It’s clear that a tremendous amount of attention to detail was put in to communicating our financial state.

Vacancies Abound in Town Meeting

How does a “political hotbed” town like Billerica follow up a pathetic 13.0% showing at the polls?  By leaving scads of Town Meeting seats empty.

In a letter to Town Meeting Representatives this week, the City Clerk reports that there are a jaw-dropping 30 seats empty, or 12.3% of the total 243 seats.  There is at least one seat open in every precinct except #5:

• 4 vacancies in Precinct 1
• 2 vacancies in Precinct 2
• 4 vacancies in Precinct 3
• 4 vacancies in Precinct 4
• 2 vacancies in Precinct 6
• 1 vacancies in Precinct 7
• 1 vacancies in Precinct 8
• 2 vacancies in Precinct 9
• 4 vacancies in Precinct 10
• 6 vacancies in Precinct 11

Last year there were 25 seats empty after the election.

To be fair, Town Moderator Gil Moreira told me that this is not too out of the ordinary for the last 10 years or so.  Fair enough, but it is still sad that we can’t come up with enough warm bodies out of 20,000+ registered voters to fill a couple hundred seats.

The good news is this gives an opportunity to anyone who wants to grab a TM seat without doing any of the paperwork or getting the 10 signatures.

So if you are within the sound of my voice and you do not already hold a seat in TM, please attend the preliminary meeting next Thursday, April 28 at 7:30 at Town Hall.  Attend your precinct’s caucus and ask for a seat.

If any of the items I’ve written about in this space interest you, this is your opportunity to help.  We may have nights where only 170 or so TMRs bother to show up, so every vote counts that much more.

If you want your town to be better, government has to be better, and that starts with curious, intelligent, positive people serving on Town Meeting.

Thank you, and I’ll see you there.

Spreadsheet Election

Last week we covered the candidates for the Planning Board.  It was a pleasure to read their ideas on what the town should look like over the next several years.  Especially Ms. Mahoney and Mr. Ramos, who gave thoughtful and creative answers to these questions.

Now we turn to the Board of Selectmen, who are not nearly as warm and fuzzy on the issues the town faces.  As you’ll see, I tried to keep the conversation on soft quality-of-life issues, but it didn’t work.  Instead the answers were rigid and centered on that standby political recession gem — money.

Money issues are very important, but it’s a real shame that they have dominated this campaign.  I’m not even sure everyone considers money to be the headliner in this election.  Consider the Lowell Sun’s summary of the BATV debate.  Notice that the Planning Board’s comments on the growth issues (such as the Zombie Mall) lead the article and take up three-quarters of the column space.

And before you go any further, read an in-depth look at the debate by Rick.

Taxes are like the weather: everybody talks about it, but nobody ever does anything about it.  Paul Marasco points out that our taxes have gone up 75% since 2000.  That’s a lot, but the BOS sets the tax rates, and BOS candidates always promise to limit taxes during the campaign.  But each year since 2000 the BOS has voted to raise taxes to the maximum allowed by Prop 2 1/2.  And TM?  Amid a deep recession, TM cut exactly $0 from the budget last Spring.  So where has all this talking about taxes gotten us?

I have a reminder for everyone running for office this year:

We do not live in a spreadsheet

A town is a collection of places, people, and ideas.  Not columns on a ledger.  Who among us can get excited about the guy who is going to move the right numbers to right cells in an Excel file?  I don’t know, but I can tell you that the grand opening of the new library ten years ago made a lot of people smile.  That is what making life better is all about.

Before we get to Q and A part of this post, I want to spend some time on Bob Acccomando.  Bob flatly refused to answer my questions, which I sent to all three candidates by e-mail.  He wanted his response to be “in my own words, not edited or taken out of context.”  I assured him I would simply paste his answers — written by him in his own words — into my column and not altered in any way.  But that did not satisfy him.

So where does Bob stand on growth, zoning upgrades, public infrastructure, and the like?  For a sitting Selectman, he says very little.  Last year, he was the only of the five BOS members to address TM 0 times.  He does not have a campaign web site.  Do we guess?

I’ve had the opportunity of having a pair of pleasant conversations with Bob.  Before the roof started leaking in earnest, I patronized his dry cleaning business at the Mall.  I asked him about the condition of the Mall and he spoke positively about his landlord, saying that RD Management is responsive to tenants and that improvements were being made to the place. I asked him about what came next, after the building’s useful life was over, and he was vague and disinterested.  My impression is that he likes his current space and that was enough for him.

Bob is a nice man with a good heart.  Is that enough to make a good Selectman in a town of 40,000 people with a very diverse set of needs?  You decide.  But since you’re asking me, I can’t support someone who wouldn’t participate in an interview.

So then we are left with two men, both with impressive resumes.

Dave Gagliardi

Looking at his bio, you’ll see that he’s served on just about every town committee there is, including the 2003 Master Plan (more on this later).  Most notably, he has served on the Finance Committee since 1998.  When you read through his web site’s Questions page, you’ll find that he places a heavy focus on his committee experience.

Paul Marasco

In contrast to Dave’s recent hard-numbers finance committee experience, Paul served as chairman of the Planning Board.  While the outspoken Bob Casey made all the headlines during the grinding Home Depot process, Paul ably presided over testy public meetings.  He also cast the deciding ‘no’ vote on the HD permit — despite the predicable lawsuit.  It was a signature act of leadership in a town that needs more guts at the helm.

And now to my questions:

Q: In 2009, then-Town Manager Bill Williams embarrassed his employer by saying publicly that Billerica lacks “curb appeal.”  Two years later, how much improvement has there been?

DG: Given the state of the economy, it is not really all that surprising that there hasn’t been much improvement. I wouldn’t expect there to be sweeping changes anytime soon. As far as the curb appeal comment, truth be told, Billerica like most cities and towns does have its warts. If you drive up Boston Road you see a mix of business and residential and some are not all that pretty to look at. This is not a recent occurrence. Some of those buildings date as far back as the 1800’s.

Dave didn’t understand what Williams meant by curb appeal.  He was looking at the town with the critical eye of a Realtor, something all Billerica elected people should do.  Mr. Williams lived about a mile away from Town Hall and would often walk to work through the town center.  If you’ve ever taken this walk, you know what he saw.  We’ve all driven through the center thousands of times, but you see new things when you walk it, which almost no one has done.  You see long stretches of beaten down dirt rather can concrete sidewalk.  You see street without curbing, trash, dirt, and rubble along the road.  You see, smell, and hear the cars and trucks charging by.  Before you get to the historic center, you see unattractive, cinder block buildings and strip malls flagged with towering ’70s-era signs on the street, engulfed by cratered, empty, treeless parking lot.  And you will likely not encounter a single human being on foot.  That’s the lack of appeal Mr. Williams was talking about.  Not the 19th century buildings in the historic center — those are beautiful even if they need a little repainting.

It’s going to take quite a comprehensive effort to change things.

Aha!  Now we are getting somewhere.  Does this mean Mr. Gagliardi is open to change?  Is he willing to take a leadership role?  We’ll see in his other answers.

Let’s also bring in some content from Dave’s own web site, where he asks himself about the Zombie Mall:

What would you suggest we do about the Mall property?

There have been more than enough suggestions from just about everyone you talk to about what would be best for that property. I think that maybe the time has come to reach out to the Mall owner and ask him what he sees for the future of his property instead of telling him what we think he should do. Then we need to ask what the Town can do to help facilitate that end. I realize that this won’t be easy because of the obvious bad blood that exists between the Town and the Mall owner; however I believe that nothing is going to happen until we attempt to mend some fences. It’s important for both parties to understand that neither benefits from the situation that exists now and a cooperative effort is needed to make things happen. To illustrate this point we need to look no further than Wilmington. On Route 38 the shopping plaza on one side of the street was refurbished. A new plaza was built on the other side and is now fully occupied in a very bad economy. The street was also redesigned to improve traffic flow. I am not suggesting that something of that grand of scale be done in Billerica but I am saying that this is an example of what can be achieved when the Town and the business community work cooperatively and together toward a goal that benefits both.

So, which is it, Dave?  Billerica couldn’t grow because of the economy and Wilmington could?  You can’t have it both ways.  If the recession, and not something Billerica leadership has done wrong, has prevented growth here, then how did Wilmington do it?

Second, Dave talks about meeting with the Mall owners asking what they want.  He should talk to his Town Manager.  I did. Mr. Curran has already met with the management company.  In brief, RD Management has no intention of going before the Planning Board, and therefore will not make any real improvements to the property.  It’s not about mending fences.  It’s about business.  They need a financial incentive to invest in (or someone else to invest if they want to sell) their property.  The answer lies in the citizen’s hands, now.  Are we willing to make changes?  Will Mr. Gagliardi support the Town Manager in his plan to improve this property and others in the center or work against him?

Third, of all places to give as an example of growth, why would you pick Route 38 in Wilmington?  This ugly stretch of Main Street has exploded into a collection of 24-hour drug stores, strip malls, and fast food joints.  It is suburban sprawl at its worst — an orgy of retail-only land use spewing out traffic at a high rate.  Remember when Sonic opened up?  They had to pay 2 police details for three weeks to handle all the cars coming in and out.  The street had to be redesigned to improve traffic flow because of all the extra trips it had to absorb.  At full retail build-out, even 4 lanes won’t be enough.  Anyone who drives it (as I do, to access the train station) knows that it’s very unsafe because there are no left-turn lanes.  Additionally, the gleaming new sidewalks are empty because the area is to car-dominated to be comfortable to walk, and Wilmington is on the hook to maintain an asset no one uses.

Why not talk about Reading, which also grew during the recession, but did so in a much more manageable and pleasant way?

Paul said this:

PM: I do not agree with the Ex Town Manager’s position that Billerica lacked curb appeal.  As a member of the Planning Board for 10 years I never heard comments such as that to businesses wanting to invest in our Town. Billerica has always been well positioned in the region for two reasons: geographical ease of access and financial incentives.  Geographically Billerica has great access from many directions.  There is a local Tax Incentive Financing program and a DOR Tax Credit Program that will assist businesses financially to move to Billerica.  The Town Manager was not here long enough to understand the issues Billerica faces, of which curb appeal was not one.

Look, I realize it’s political suicide to say that your town is ugly.  I leaned that the hard way, and it cost Bill Williams his job.  But to say that Billerica does not face a curb appeal problem?  Even Mr. Gagliardi admitted our town has “its warts.”

Second, the geographical advantage argument does not wash.  Every town has access to at least one freeway.  Mr. Curran pointed out to me that Woburn (the city for which he was once mayor) has direct access to I-93 and 128.  Chelmsford has Route 3 and 495.  They, along with a lot of other towns in the region, beat us in that regard.  As far as financial incentives, fair enough.  But when you have to pay a company to come here (which is another way of looking at a tax break) you can’t say we attract those companies because Billerica is awesome.

Finally, the reason why you won’t hear Billerica businesses complain about curb appeal is because it’s not smart money to put down the community you’re counting on for your income.  Ask the business who have already left or who chose another place over Billerica and you will get a more candid answer.

The first step to improving yourself is admitting that you need to improve.

Q: Over the past five years, has the pace of land development along Boston Road been too fast or too slow?  What type of growth is appropriate over the next five years?

PM: You cannot measure the pace of growth.  There are many economic factors that Influence growth.  The type of growth that is appropriate is growth that lowers the residential real estate taxes, creates local jobs, respects and preserves our quality of life and heritage.

OK, Paul did mention quality of life.  That’s good.  But why did he pass on an opportunity to talk about Smart Growth, which is the third of his three goals?  Puzzling.

DG: I wouldn’t say it has been fast or slow. Again, I wouldn’t expect to see much in the way of development right now. The type of growth depends on how the available land is zoned.

Bingo!  Dave had a different approach in his web site Mall answer (see above), where he said we should talk to the landowner.  But we citizens have complete power over our own zoning code, and therefore the general direction, scale, and location of future growth.  Why are we so afraid to use that power?

Some of the signs on the empty parcels I have seen for sale say “commercially zoned.” It would be up to the ZBA or Planning Board to apply the law to those parcels. Anyone wishing to change the zoning on those parcels would need to sell the idea to Town Meeting which can be a daunting task.

You’re telling me?

Q: A set of plans to fix the roads around the Town Common was drafted in 2002 and is collecting dust in the Town Engineer’s office.  What specific action would to take to advance this project?

DG: I was in favor of that project, and wanted to see it move forward, but the money was just not available to get the project going. I still believe that something should be done but I would guess that a ten year old plan may need some updating. There would need to be money available to do that and a reasonable expectation that money for such a project also be available before we could begin to move forward again.

There is no money.  If we want state money, we have to get on the Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) and wait.  And we won’t catch a whiff of the construction cash until we have a completed set of design plans, which we don’t have either.  The Town Manager’s opinion is that this money must come from new development in the center.  You can see the chicken/egg problem developing.

PM: The Town Center is a fragile environment.  As past member of the planning board for over 10 years and currently a member of the Board of Selectman, I have recently taken action to approve our current Town Manager to move forward on a peer to peer review of the Town’s Center traffic solution. These peers are Officials have solved similar problems they faced in their Town Centers.  This would be current, solution based alternatives to compare to our existing plans on file.  Any plan that dates as far back as 2002 and was not acted upon should have a comparison to real time information.

Paul was nice enough to meet with me at the center recently and we talked about this issue.  He is very interested in improving the roads around Town Common, and we shared some ideas.  Getting a design done as soon as possible, which will take at least a year of public process, is very important, and Paul understands that.

Q Billerica has done a good job of drawing mid-sized and large employers. Now how can we attract new small businesses?

PM: Control Town spending and the effect will lower the real estate taxes for both the Residents and the Businesses.  The affordability factors will then attract small businesses to Town.  The Towns that are going to survive this Recession/depression are the ones that are affordable to live and work in.

Yes, businesses like low taxes.  But they also like to site themselves in vibrant communities, ones that put a lot of effort into looking nice.  Retail businesses love foot traffic.  So, sure, let’s work on keeping the commercial tax rate low.  But that’s not all we have to do.  And remember, towns with the lowest residential tax rates have one of two things in common — either crappy services or a big commercial tax base.  Which do you pick?

DG: Actually I think the Town has done a pretty good job with small business. As I drive around looking at our little strip malls, I find that most are full or near full. Our biggest problem right now is filling the large empty commercial/industrial buildings in town. That is going to be the biggest challenge in the immediate future.

Disagree.  Dave’s answer suggests we don’t need any new small businesses.  Full?  Huh?  Doesn’t every community on Planet Earth actively foster small business growth?  No argument that we have a ton of empty industrial space, but is that really our biggest challenge?  Make the town a place that small businesses can’t wait to get into, and the rest will follow.

Q: If elected, will you speak in favor of the town center mixed use zoning articles on the Town Meeting floor?

DG: I wasn’t in favor of the mixed use plan the four times it was presented for various reasons.

It doesn’t bother me that Dave (or anyone else) doesn’t support mixed use.  But there’s no reason that he has to mention “the four times it was presented.”  That fact is irrelevant to its merit.  It’s also not accurate.  Mixed use has been presented only twice to TM (Spring and Fall of 2009).  (The articles appeared on prior warrants but were withdrawn before the meetings opened, which is common with complex articles.)

More importantly, the tone of this sentence suggests Dave is annoyed that we are still talking about it.  Instead of talking about a way to bring the pro and con sides together, he sounds like he wants it to all go away so we can just go back to talking about cutting taxes.  Politics, not people.

One of the biggest is that I don’t find the need for that type of development in our center.

Thousands of Billerica taxpayers do.  Not sure how someone who has spent years on committees doesn’t “find the need” that 65% of Town Meeting does?  How many empty parking spaces will it take for him to see the need?  Another 500?  A thousand?  What about when he was sitting on the Master Plan committee, the one that called for mixed use zoning in the center?  Did he see the need then and has changed his mind since?

I know that the Town Manager plans to propose a different type of plan and I will be open to considering it but I will have to be convinced that the need is there and it will be a significant benefit to the town.

Significant benefit?  What is the cost of upgrading our zoning code?  That would be $0.  That means that even a tiny benefit would make it worth doing.

Personally, I would rather see the effort and expense put toward the redesign of the center. I think before you can consider a zoning change we should look at a redesign.

By “redesign of the center,” I think he means the road improvement project, and as mentioned previously, the money for that will not be available without new growth.  Stalemate.

Paul says:

PM: I am in favor of the mixed use zoning articles if it can be clearly demonstrated that the Center will be safe for pedestrians.

Another missed opportunity to talk about Smart Growth.  Thought he would distinguish himself from his opponents but supporting new zoning, which a majority of citizens want.  Too bad.

I will not sacrifice safety of our children and the residents for any reason.   We need to improve the unsafe pedestrian, traffic and parking environment that we currently face.

OK, so we all agree we need to fix the roads, but no one has said how.  My suggestion is to run both planning processes (the zoning and the road improvements) at the same time — right now.  Then when the first developer comes knocking, we will have a finished road plan drawn, and the mitigation package can pay to build it.

In summary, we’ve have plenty of tax talk and a little tepid language about growth from the BOS candidates.  Nowhere near the vision imagination we heard in the PB interview.  Still, these three men can each serve competently on the board.  Hopefully the soft and fuzzy feelings will set in after the election.  Maybe then they can put the spreadsheets to the side and can help us build dreams.

The election is April 2.  Polls are open from 8am to 8pm.