BREAKING NEWS: No action on workforce housing in Northeast Harbor; next meeting Sept. 13
NORTHEAST HARBOR, Aug. 10, 2023 - The Planning Board meeting Wednesday night, which had high expectations for a decision on the proposed workforce housing project in the village, instead turned into a tedious, prolonged prophylactic exercise to fortify legal arguments against an eventual lawsuit by either side.
The board adjourned shortly after 9 and continued the meeting to Sept. 13 to complete its “compliance review” with no visibility into the timeline for a vote or appeals.
Despite the official public hearing having ended in June, Chairman Bill Hanley opened the meeting to public comments, resulting in the re-litigation of many of the same issues around density, buffering and traffic.
One speaker questioned the pollution generated by 15 cars.
The meeting was a full house, dominated by summer folks. Three members of the select board also attended, as well as the applicant, Kathy Miller, executive director of Mount Desert 365, her attorney, Dan Pileggi, her project engineer Greg Johnston and land-use consultant Noel Musson.
Most of the session consisted of comments from the board’s attorney, Andy Hamilton, chair Hanley, Grady Burns, lawyer for the neighbors objecting to the workforce housing, Pileggi and Johnson.
The non-profit MD 365 purchased the property in 2019 at the corner of Manchester and Neighborhood roads to construct six units of “workforce” housing to help bring back year-round families in the village which has become a summer colony for the wealthy.
Burns argued that the “extreme density requested here is accomplished by bending and breaking the ordinance provisions governing residential developments and workforce subdivisions.”
The QSJ will follow up and file a fuller report before the next meeting.
I think the more proper question is how much pollution will be REDUCED by 15 cars not commuting to and from MDI daily?
Maybe ALL the work force in NEH should go on strike and just not answer the phone next time a toilet backs up! Let those rich folks find their own sorry ways to get things done. Yup, a workforce strike. How about a years worth. Then plumbers, electricians , carpenters, lawn care, boat captains, jet pilots, caddies, NEH Yacht club employees, garbage pick up could find work in SWH, Tremont and Bar Harbor. Let them import their own work force employees and have them do stay overs.