Sanbornton - Workforce Housing: discussion and voting results - Granite Grok

Sanbornton – Workforce Housing: discussion and voting results

Yes, mea culpa – I spelled Sanbornton wrong in every single one of the following videos; I apologize!  On Thursday, May 1st, the Sanbornton Planning Board held a session in which the town’s residents could ask questions about the upcoming voting on zoning Amendments, especially as Workforce Housing (e.g., low cost, higher density, clustered developments).  It was clear, especially when the Town Planner had an outburst of “YOU HAVE YOUR FUTURES!  YOU HAVE YOUR AGENDA 21s!!!” in trying to deny NH State Rep Jane Cormier a few minutes to speak (Ah yes, the retaliation of our betters against “the rabble”, eh?) that the board was attempting to “stack the meeting’.  While a couple of folks seemed to be in favor of the WFH oriented Amendments, most were not.  All videos after the jump.

In fact, the voting on the amendments yesterday showed that the whole concept got a huge thumbs DOWN as evidenced by the article in today’s Laconia Daily Sun (emphasis mine, reformatted):

WORKFORCE HOUSING AMENDMENTS TAKE BEATING IN SANBORNTON

…All six zoning ordinance amendments failed as town residents said no to so-called workforce housing.

Pretty it wasn’t for those that were for these.  As I listened to the entire meeting from the 1st, I mentally kept checking off in my head – yup, this is the EPA / HUD / DOT’s Sustainable Communities Initiative.  Yes, as you can hear the Planner’s outburst and  the Lawyer’s drone that Agenda 21 is “voluntary”, know that SCI comes with Federal money with strings attached.  Still voluntary, but strings attached places a burden on the townfolk by those planners that are seemingly in lockstep with “Smart Growth” (SCI under another rubric).  While it seems that ‘those that know better’ were all in on this, the townfolk said, in no uncertain terms, that we aren’t about to be hornswaggled:

  • Amendment 1: failed – 312 yeses and 331 nos.
  • Amendment 2: failed – 267 yeses and 384 nos.
  • Amendment 3 (which went to the heart of workforce housing): failed – 173 yeses and 487 nos.
  • Amendment 4:  failed – 247 yeas and 410 nays.
  • Amendment 5:  failed – 160 yeas and 491 nays
  • Amendment 6: failed – 219 yeas and 434 nays

Here is the discussion that may have had the townfolks going “Absolutely NOT!”.

Part 1:

   

Part 2                                                                  Part 3

  

Part 4                                                                  Part 5

  

Part 6                                                              Part 7

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