Dear Editor,

The town does have building codes and an exemption process, in addition to a Planning Commission. Following, I am citing Ron Mitchell, only because it’s a fact that he owns the majority of the buildings in the central business district. Over the years, I’ve been a supporter of 90% of Ron’s plans, and cite him solely due to his property ownership.

Ron had a project planned for 10-12 (affordable) studio housing rentals, across from Snyder St. and the highway, where Over the Rainbow childcare once was, for workforce housing. However, he pulled that. It had nothing to do with town staff/ government, personalities, or corruption as some folks are fond of saying. Ron also had a plan to pop-top the downtown buildings up to 3-stories for (affordable) studio-1 bedroom housing for the local workforce. People were in favor of that (two stories only). However, he pulled that. Again, it had nothing to do with town staff/government, personalities, or corruption.

Meanwhile, in a short period of time, Resham Gurung successfully went through the building process, and had a couple of her buildings pop topped in the CBD, providing 1-bedroom apartments. It’s up to Ron as the property owner to redevelop the CBD, or sell the buildings to people who might be interested in doing that. Though being ‘affordable’ (below market rate) rentals is up to the property owner.

Ron had been very gracious over the years to hold public review sessions of his plans for the CBD to seek public input. However, that is not a requirement for anyone to do so. If you have complaints about the lack of CBD redevelopment, talk to Ron, not rant about town hall or the board of trustees (BoT).

Where the old town shop had once been, approximately 10-12 subsidized infill housing units had been planned with Habitat for Humanity since the Mud Lake agreement, where the new Wild Bear Nature Center is being built. Over time, aspects of that agreement were nullified. So, it has sat. However, it is still very viable for subsidized infill housing. Disagreement over density housing infill at that location is typical. However, while many of the people in that neighborhood favor subsidized infill housing; some do not want it in their neighborhood.

I believe that the need and demand for affordable housing is never going to be satisfied or go away. However, the aforementioned already talked about 30 subsidized 1-bedroom units for the local workforce. Not in addition to the 12-16 subsidized 1-bedroom units I’ve been advocating for almost twelve years for local disadvantaged elders. And, Kayla’s Bobcat Ridge annexation plan for 2-bedroom ‘affordable’ family apartments, and some detached housing.

In my (not humble) opinion, I get so annoyed by the ill-informed lemmings that continue to rant on town staff and the BoT. One solution may be for those who do live in town, and are registered town voters, is to step forward and invest in ‘our’ town by applying for Board of Trustees positions; in addition to the Planning Commission. Become proactive.

Yes, everyone is busy with something, it’s a time-consuming unpaid job, and can be intense at times. Back in the day, and there’s still some folks around who remember, there were some who served on the BoT for a few decades, lol. I can only imagine the difficulty to attract candidates not changing; until some annexations could expand the base of potential candidates.

I’m starting to believe that the only way to bypass the contentiousness of annexations (which in one of my previous letters I wrote that it seems to occur every 20 years), in order to provide for the services and infrastructure needs of the town to be met, as had happen in some Colorado towns and counties; just build market rate housing for the financially comfortable. Housing for people whose taxes will support the infrastructure. And, have the folks that fill the services jobs and infrastructure needs of the town, who aren’t able to afford things like housing rentals, or childcare, or enough food, or elder homecare, (some might consider a drain on existing services and infrastructure) they could commute into town from somewhere else, wherever that may be.

Atashnaa Medicineshield Werner

Nederland