At the August 15, 2023 TC meeting Hudes proposed a motion which would have required the TC to vote on the final draft of the HE prior to submitting it to HCD. That motion was defeated 3 to 2. As a result, the TC was sidelined in the review and approve process. Moore needs to explain why that decision made any sense.
These comments were focused on 2023 only since Ristow was Mayor for that year. During 2023 the Town submitted 5 drafts to HCD for review, which included the adopted HE which the TC did vote to adopt on January 30, 2023. (It failed)
None of the subsequent four “final” drafts were voted on by the TC prior to submission to HCD. They weren’t even reviewed by the TC. All of the reviews were done by the HEAB.
The Staff had the authority to submit on behalf of the TC. The Staff didn’t want the TC to review and approve prior to submission nor did Ristow, Moore and Rennie. They wanted the TC to vote only after the draft had gotten the green light from HCD. That way the TC had no power to change the document since who in their right mind would vote against a draft that had been approved by HCD. This was the plan Prevetti had cooked up to by pass and neutralize the TC which was supported by Ristow when she was Mayor.
When Badame became the mayor, things began to change. The TC became more engaged and provided more oversite. But for purposes of fact checking Moore’s claim that he voted to send the draft to HCD every time it was ready – that is false. There are at least 4 drafts that were submitted that were never voted on or even reviewed by the TC.
Worse, one of these drafts were submitted to HCD without going through the public review process prior to submission. We objected to that and wrote a letter to HCD pointing out the Town had violated State Law by doing this. The town then had to go through the public review process as stated in the rules.
One last point – voting on the draft prior to submission was a meaningless act since the gang of three never sought compromise and always voted as a block. What they wanted they got. Moore’s claim is all showmanship without any substance. He is trying to paint a picture where the minority members somehow delayed the process when they had no way to do this. They were the minority!
One more thing – Moore is making a big deal over the gang of supporting the final draft that ultimately got approved by HCD and Hudes and Badame not supporting that draft. What Moore fails to mention is there is no way to know if the draft had been changed to reflect the changes Hudes and Badame wanted, that HCD wouldn’t have approved that version as well.
And in our opinion the changes being suggested reduced the uncontrolled development the gang of three wanted and was more in line with what the public wanted. This gets to the point about Moore’s judgment – remember he also had made the finding that the January 30, 2023 draft was in compliance with State Law even though HCD had told him it wasn’t. Moore settled for an inferior HE because he screwed up over 16 months earlier and lacks the judgment to make a good decision.
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