A sharply divided subcommittee of the Martha’s Vineyard Commission completed an evaluation of a proposal for a golf club along the Edgartown Great Pond with little in the way of accord this week, but decided to wait one more week before voting on a recommendation on the project.
“This committee is not going to come up with a clear recommendation,” declared commission member Linda Sibley.
“The committee is going to come out with two reports,” concluded commission member Jennie Greene.
“This committee has done a lot of good work. I think we should go home and think about it and come back next Monday and work on some conditions. We have labored on this since day one, and I would like this committee to hear some possible conditions,” said Michael Donaroma, who is chairman of the subcommittee.
The remarks came during a meeting of the commission land use planning committee on Monday night. The committee is charged with developing a recommendation on the Meeting House Golf Club project. Deliberations began in earnest last week.
The project is planned for some 200 acres of land owned by the MacKenty and Bigelow families along the Edgartown Great Pond. The developers of the project are Rosario and Barry Lattuca, a father and son team from Natick, and Richard Friedman, a seasonal homeowner who is also a Boston real estate developer.
On Monday night the discussion at the MVC, which went on for about two hours, grew heated at times as commission members vigorously disagreed on an array of points from housing impacts to policy interpretations.
For the second week in a row, the committee was divided nearly down the middle as it considered a range of issues, including whether the project is consistent with the goals of the town and the MVC master plans, and whether it is consistent with the regulations for the Edgartown Great Pond district of critical planning concern. There was especially heated discussion about whether the project will have a negative impact on the seasonal employee shortage, which some say has reached crisis proportion on the Island.
“Lenny is the one who said this is just a game,” said Mrs. Sibley, referring to a statement made early on in the deliberations by MVC member Leonard Jason Jr. “This is just a game and it is in competition for employees for essential services,” said Mrs. Sibley, who argued passionately that the planned private golf club would add another layer of stress to the heavily stressed seasonal labor market.
Mrs. Sibley noted that the regional housing authority had taken the same position, and there was some disagreement and a flurry of confusion as commission and staff members tried to locate a letter written by the housing authority on the project. In fact, the housing authority wrote two letters. One was submitted in January expressing support for the project, but in March a second letter was read into the record by housing authority chairman Randi Vega which expressed strong concern about the impact of the project on the seasonal labor crisis. The developers have agreed to contribute $300,000 to the housing authority, and in the letter Mrs. Vega acknowledged the generous contribution, but also said there is no longer any way to mitigate the acute summer labor shortage.
There is agreement in most quarters that the seasonal labor shortage is directly connected to the problem workers have finding summer housing amid sky-high summer rent prices.
This week members of the commission disagreed about how to interpret the housing authority’s letters and also about the degree of the seasonal labor shortage.
“There is always going to be competition among the businesses for workers. Competition is a good thing — I don’t see people sleeping in the streets,” said commission member Michael Colaneri. “And if they can’t get any help. . . .”
“Then that’s their problem,” said Mrs. Greene, finishing his sentence.
“There is no crisis here — there is a crisis in Kosovo. There isn’t a crisis on Martha’s Vineyard, for Christ sake,” Mr. Colaneri said.
Mrs. Sibley, who owns an Island business, was incredulous.
“Listen to me, please, because you do not understand the employment problems on this Island in the summer,” Mrs. Sibley said to Mr. Colaneri. “Any 14-year-old who can get a work permit and can stand upright can get a job,” she said.
There was similarly sharp disagreement when committee members tried to evaluate whether the project is consistent with the Edgartown Ponds district of critical planning concern (DCPC). Section 15 of the MVC statute says the commission cannot grant a development permit for a development of regional impact (DRI) unless it finds that the project is consistent with any DCPC regulations.
The project as it is now proposed violates the DCPC, which prohibits any chemical use within 300 feet of the pond and also limits the area of turf grass to 2,500 square feet within 300 feet of the pond. The project includes some 11 acres of greens, tees, fairways and roughs within the 300-foot DCPC zone. “That’s more than 500,000 square feet of managed turf,” Mrs. Sibley said. “This is one of those rare times when a DRI intersects with a DCPC,” she said.
Mr. Donaroma said the Edgartown Great Pond DCPC regulations were written with residential subdivisions in mind. “Lawns were not a desired use in there — it was not desired to have a New Jersey-style lawn in that area,” said Mr. Donaroma, who sat on the committee that developed the regulations for the special planning district. But Mr. Donaroma, who supports the golf project, said he thinks the commission can address the problem by prohibiting the use of any chemicals within the 300-foot zone.
The developers have said they intend to apply for a waiver to the regulations. On Monday night, commission member Christina Brown, who is also a member of the Edgartown conservation commission, read aloud from the text of the waiver process for the regulations. Mrs. Brown urged the committee to evaluate whether the waiver process would apply to the golf course. But Mrs. Greene and others said that is better left up to the local board.
“It’s up to the conservation commission,” she said.
Hanging their opinions on technical detail, both Mrs. Greene and Mr. Jason said they feel the project meets the DCPC regulations, since the regulations include a process for a waiver.
Others disagreed.
“To me the language of chapter 831 is very clear — it says it [the development project] has to be consistent [with the DCPC regulations],” Mrs. Sibley said.
In the end, the committee agreed to take one more week to discuss the possible conditions for the project, although it was clear at the end of the meeting that the vote would either be evenly split or come out against the project. Mr. Donaroma was expected to report to the commission at its regular meeting last night, but he said he would like to wait one more week before bringing the project to the full commission for a vote.
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