westwood station

It is probably an overstatement to say that tonight's vote will ultimately decide the fate of Westwood Station. Over the past several years, the project has been punctuated by a series of do-or-die moments, followed by periods of dormancy. All the while, there has been almost non-existent communication from the project to the residents except at these critical votes--although I must credit Chris McKeown, the project manager, with his willingness to discuss the project with me and others who have questions. I am convinced there is no active effort to hide anything and in fact, the people working on this are working tirelessly to deal with the complicated minutiae of the details and the constantly shifting economic and political climate. The volume of material released in the past few months is a sincere effort to provide residents with as much information as possible.

It is a great deal of information though. Perhaps too much information. Hours of presentations don't add up to more transparency, just more meetings to sit through waiting to speak. I'm sure tonight, we will have to sit for at least an hour to be educated on I-Cubed while many people are just sitting there waiting for a chance to ask questions like:

If the state is willing to contribute $49 million to get this project moving, how can it possibly stall based on a lack of an extra $6 million?

As far as I can tell the purpose of I-Cubed involvement here is more political than practical. It gives the Town some "skin in the game" so to speak. It provides an opportunity to launch an innovative program (I-Cubed has not be utilized anywhere else yet) with a high degree of leverage so that when the overall project is successful, the Governor can point to this initiative as having made the difference. It would make a great case-study in public-private partnership--and maybe it should--but that is not our concern.

Our concern is first of all whether we should use this vote to try and kill a project we don't like. Are we willing to walk away from this and hope we can find other sources of tax revenue in the future to prevent or lessen overrides? The vote is pretty easy if you make that choice first. After that, it's just a bunch of predictions, legalese, assumptions, and speculation to rationalize a choice already made.

I am not a person who just defers to authority...but it seems this kind of proposal is precisely what the Finance Commission was created to evaluate. There are 15 people on that Commission who reviewed this and have been involved in the process all along to varying degrees. The material that has been published sits out there for people with more time on their hands and a bigger axe to grind than I...and no one has presented a strong technical or financial argument against I-Cubed of which I am aware. Last year we argued about liquor licenses and fairness to Roche Bros.; this year, it seems there are many questions and suspicion/skepticism but not a strong argument against the program itself.

So to me, it comes back to Westwood Station itself. If you think what's currently proposed is going to be a net negative to quality of life in town, vote no. Otherwise, vote yes and let's get on with this thing.

Civic
Agenda

In two weeks, if Town Meeting rejects the I-Cubed Funding proposal for Westwood Station, it probably kills the project. Over the next two weeks, the town is holding two important public hearings where residents will have an opportunity to learn what is really at stake.

In addition, the town has updated the town website with materials related to this project at:

http://townhall.westwood.ma.us/index.cfm?pid=15395

The public meetings are:

• First, this Tuesday, April 20, at 7:30pm, the Board of Selectmen and Finance Commission will hold a "Public Information Session" in the High School Cafeteria. more information
• Second, on Monday, April 26, the Finance Commission will hold its final public hearing on the Annual Town Meeting articles. This meeting will be at 7:30pm in the High School Little Theatre. more information

I've spoken with people at Town Hall who are know as much about this project as anyone and while I have been unable to convince anyone to "go public" and post on this blog, I would like the share the following information about facts and perceptions that I have obtained. It is impossible to completely separate fact from opinion but I hope this will be helpful and I encourage anyone who wants to question and learn more to attend this public meetings if they can and/or post questions here to begin and continue a discussion over the next two weeks. This is a lot of "dry" information, so I'm going to use some editorial license and sum each item up with my own sentence. I have criticisms of my own, but I am going to hold off for now and see what develops in this discussion.

• There's no conspiracy about timing. The timing of the release of all this information 2 to 2 1/2 weeks before Town Meeting is due to delays in working out the many pieces of the compromises involved to obtain cooperation from the Town of Canton and coordinate the state funding. Ultimately, the matter will be decided by Town Meeting and with 2 weeks to go...that's enough time for everyone with an opinion to prepare and argue their case.
• The "plan" remains intact. The newly proposed Phase 1 is not a "drastically reduced WWS project." Phase 1 consists of 35 acres – leaving 111 permitted acres to be developed. The WWS master plan remains in tact and eventually, the belief of the everyone involved with this project is that the remainder of the area will be developed.
• The $55 million state grant requires reduced scope in Phase 1. The state imposed a 500K sq. ft. cap on retail, prior to the Dedham Street corridor improvements, as a condition of the $55MM infrastructure funding. see http://townhall.westwood.ma.us/westwood/file/2010-01-19%20$55M.pdf and http://www.westwoodma.gov/westwood/file/2010-04-01%20Jan%2019%20letter%2.... Given that there would be no WWS without the infrastructure funding, the developer (and now Westwood) have two choices – accept the conditions or, pass on the $55M and wait to see what the future brings.
• Phase 1 is not a big box mall.It has the same anchor tenants and retailers as before, with some small boutique type retailers and a few restaurants. At the moment there are 2 anchors (Target & Wegmans), 6 junior anchors, 15 small retailers and 2-3 restaurants. It is about 300K sq. ft. less dense then what was programmed there before. The belief among those planning the development is that this remains a good start to broader development at Westwood Station.
• State money is good no matter what. In addition to keeping the Westwood Station project alive, the $55M in infrastructure will benefit Westwood by making the Westwood Station area much more ripe for development. Perhaps you could characterize it as making the area "developer-ready." Also, it sets the stage for the 93/95 interchange work to be accelerated. That project will unlock substantial economic development for Westwood. This funding covers the first components of the 93/95 project and the prospect of that initial work has already generated great interest in finishing the broader project much sooner.

When I say "2-week warning" (analogizing to a 2-minute warning in football) I'm not playing the "doom and gloom" game here. The reality is that if Westwood walks away from a $55 million state intervention it's going to kill this thing. But that does not mean we have to close the schools and turn off the tap water. It just means doubt about whether the project will deliver all the promised benefits will turn into certainty that it will not and we will have to start seriously thinking of alternatives.

I want to thank Dave for spending the time and finding out more information about the I-Cube funding. I realize Westwood Station is something many residents have been waiting years for. The problem is we no longer know what we are getting. The I-Cube is an opportunity for the residents to find out exactly what is going on when it comes to Westwood Station. Trust me I am sick and tired of the high taxes in Westwood just like everyone else. What I don't want to see happen is the biggest mistake in Westwood history. Nancy Hyde and Steve Rafsky had no problem before telling the town how much positive tax revenue we would get from Westwood Station. The development has changed big time from then and now and we need to know what is going to be the net positive in tax revenue. I am not against Westwood Station I live on the other side of town. What I am against is how this project keeps changing by the minute. The town has used scare tactics more than once to get us to vote yes on different articles when it comes to Westwood Station. Now is the time to put our foot down and not allow them to use the same tactics as they have used in the past. I can see it now your sitting at town meeting and one of the selectman will say if we don't vote YES on the I-Cube the state will back out of its 55 million.

The I-Cubed funding will be presented to the FinCom a day before the annual town elections. Why is the town waiting so long to put that article on? Could it be the town wants to make sure the library gets funded before talking about the I-Cubed funding? Could it be that the less people that know about the I-Cubed funding would mean a smaller town meeting? I can only guess because the town doesn't like being very transparent. I believe Mike [Jaillett] said last night at the Government Study Task Force meeting that we will be lucky if 200 residents show up for this town meeting. If only 200 residents showed up then it would be easy to stack the deck for any article vote. For the residents that do not feel we should risk 6 million dollars maybe you should try to make this town meeting.

CC&F is getting 55 million dollars from the state and wants to ask the town to accept the I-Cube for 6 million. Who is paying for this project the state the town or CC&F? My question is does CC&F have funding yet? The town wants us to vote on 6 million dollar I-Cubed funding and I have not heard that CC&F has the funding to make this project a go. Let's do some quick math. New Library 13 million, the possibility of being on the hook for 6 million for I-Cubed funding and the very strong possibility for a large operational override next year. Let's take care of our own backyard and let CC&F do the same.  I may have some leaves on my lawn from last year but CC&F has 140 acres of overgrown weeds which I would rather not be a part of.