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7/3/09
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planning board Petition contests building moratorium
MILBRIDGE, Maine — A group of concerned residents has launched a petition drive to force a special town meeting in an attempt to overturn a 180-day moratorium on multi-family housing.
The organizers feel that a mistake was made and that many voters did not know the potential ramifications of the moratorium. Since the vote was taken in June, the town is being sued and $1.1 million in federally backed sewer grants could be in jeopardy.
Town officials maintain that the moratorium was necessary to buy them some time to create zoning ordinances and building codes, something currently lacking in Milbridge.
But Mano en Mano, a local nonprofit organization that works with area Latino families, says the reasons for the moratorium are more sinister, rooted in racism and fear.
On Wednesday, Anais Tomezsko, executive director of Mano en Mano, announced the group was suing the town of Milbridge over the moratorium and talks were already under way Thursday between a federal judge and attorneys for the town and Mano en Mano.
Mano en Mano obtained a $1 million federal Housing and Urban Development grant to build a six-unit housing complex on Wyman Road specifically for agriculture and aquaculture workers.
Tomezsko said the housing was for U.S. citizens and being Latino was never a requirement.
She also said that other projects, some of which are larger, have been built in Milbridge without concern about zoning ordinances and without prompting a moratorium.
Also Thursday, Pat Pellegrini, a former selectwoman in Milbridge, kicked off a petition drive to overturn the moratorium. Pellegrini said if a court finds the town discriminated by imposing the moratorium, all federal grants could be in jeopardy.
She said she needs to collect 52 signatures and will present the petitions to the Board of Selectmen at its July 9 meeting.
“I am going to ask them to set a special town meeting so the community can vote to rescind the moratorium,” she said. “The town has unnecessarily put itself in some serious legal jeopardy which might have been avoided if the people who voted for the moratorium on June 16 had been better informed and less fearful. As nothing was happening on a town level, I started the petition and hope to get enough signatures so that we can vote to rescind the moratorium.”
Meanwhile, the Milbridge Planning Board held the first in a series of meetings Thursday night to create new comprehensive zoning ordinances.
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Recent comments
Mikey Moonbat needs to go back to the dreaded private sector.
Karenlite, "friends?" You're kidding, right?
The state should just hire a state employee to live in every home to monitor and protect us.
I don't need a card OR a dispensary...get all the smoke I can handle, thank you!
appreciate the help too baddog, it will be a good time for sure!
1)Accuse the Milbridge residents of being "RACISTS"
2)Withold 1.1 million in Federal dollars
3)Bring multimillion dollar lawsuit against town
Looks like Anais Tomezsko is building her resume to be a Democrat Senator/Representative in Washington!
BDN, why was this story put under "Greater Bangor" new? Try "Down East"!
Using taxpayer money for this project is absolutely wrong. What an infuriating misappropriation of taxpayer money.
I am passionately involved in social justie work, and it is GROSS and DISGUSING what Anais is doing to this town. I know her kind well. CaptainAndy is 100% right. SHe should be sued by the town for defamation of charcter, but I know..............I won't hold my breath. What she WILL get is increased clout, a satisfied warped pride, awards from the Maine Women's Lobby, the Maine Council of Chruches, and the University of Maine system (among others), and a promotion for engaging in race mongering and hate speech. GREAT Job, Anais and Pelligrini!!! Don't forget though: KARMA.
This is what we all deserve, for years we have allowed people to define who we (rural Mainer's) are I attended a University class in Orono where the professor (a woman from Oregon) informed her students "Those hicks with the flag in front of their houses are all Nazis" When I objected, she asked me if I wanted a black living next door to me, when I said it depended on the character of her imagined "black" she said "see" he doesn't care about the character of the white living next to him now" actually my sister lived next door at the time.
"You've got to stand for something or you'll fall for anything." Apologies to Aaron Tippin.
It also occurs to me: How brazen of our new 'neighbors' to assume they are entitled to recieve free housing when those of us who have contributed finacially & otherwise for decades aren't entitled to the same. Then to cry racism on top of it all. Shame on those who enable the entitlement mentality.
The Real "Fault" is the lack of voters becoming involved/informed on issues and then the lack of registered voters actually VOTING.
My questions are: How much information (and that includes the consequences of the vote -whichever way it went-) was provided by the Town Council to the town voters in advance of the Vote - and by what means (did they actively promote Public Meetings to discuss? Was the issue discussed - pro and con - in any local newspapers?, etc. And what percentage of the registered voters actually voted? You deserve what you vote for. And if people don't vote, they deserve what those who do vote give them.
But RACE shouldn't matter any more than the sex of the two individuals marrying - now should it? Or does it when we talk equal opportunity or money?