By Carol Britton Meyer

In response to a request from the Hull Redevelopment Authority that the select board hold off on placing a non-binding question on the May 15 election ballot about the use of the HRA property, the board agreed to do so this week, calling any such ballot question “premature.”

In addition to a letter from HRA Chair Bartley Kelly requesting a delay while the board works on the Urban Renewal Plan, an attorney for the HRA sent a “comment letter” to the planning board to ask that it also withhold its support for a separate proposal to rezone the land to public open space. [See related story.]

Hull Village resident Harriet Bosy appeared before the select board recently to explain her request to add a question to the ballot that would ask voters if they prefer open space and recreation or residential and commercial development for the HRA property.

Because there wasn’t enough time for her to gather the required signatures before the deadline for submitting a citizen’s petition, the alternative was for the select board to decide. Following a lengthy discussion at that meeting, the board took Bosy’s request under advisement and revisited it again this week.

The draft URP is currently being presented at public meetings hosted by the HRA to hear what the community would like to see on the various portions of the property.

Once the draft version is finished, it will be presented to the select board “for their consideration and approval, amendment, or denial even,” Town Manager Philip Lemnios said.

He cited a lack of context if such a question were to be placed on the ballot at this time and that the HRA “would have grounds to appeal the outcome to the Department of Housing and Community Development and other state agencies” involved with the URP process.

The select board concurred with Lemnios’s recommendation that the best course of action would be “to allow the HRA to complete their process and present the URP to the board to analyze and to get input from citizens, and part of that process could be a recommendation to move forward with a referendum question.”

Select Board member Irwin Nesoff said while he thinks now is not the right time, he “certainly would support this type of referendum question after the HRA proposes the plan to get a sense of the temperature of the community when there is an actual proposal for them to respond to.”

Lemnios said that part of the rationale behind waiting relates to the “very contentious period between the HRA and the select board shortly after the HRA was formed [decades ago], with lawsuits back and forth. It was a tumultuous time in the history of the town.”

He also noted that the HRA is a separately elected body and that the select board has no direct authority over the HRA.

“If the HRA believes the select board acts in an arbitrary manner that is not well-reasoned, it’s a pretty good bet that they will take an appropriate legal response to that,” Lemnios said. “It’s a question of timing.”

In the early 1980s, HRA members successfully sued the town and select board members; the court found in favor of the redevelopment authority members.

After supporting the ballot question when the select board first considered it, member Domenico Sestito said that after a period of reflection, he feels now is not a good time.

“Placing a question on the ballot at this time would be of no service to the town, because we don’t know what we would be voting on,” Chair Donna Pursel said. “We’ve waited this long; let’s wait a little while longer. It wouldn’t be good to rush into this.”

At the same time, she said, “I applaud the attention and passion and involvement citizens are giving to this issue.”

Nesoff asked if Bosy, who attended the Zoom meeting, could have an opportunity to speak, but Pursel declined, since the board had already decided not to support moving the referendum question forward.

“We’re not accepting public comments tonight,” she said.

Resident Anne Murray said she was concerned about the board not allowing public comments at some meetings.

“I think the board needs to rethink this policy,” she said.

Sestito requested that a review of the select board’s rules and regulations be placed on the next meeting agenda “for a discussion about how to govern ourselves. I do have strong feelings about public input.”

In other business, the board entered into executive session after the meeting to discuss strategy relative to litigation concerning a breach or possible breach of contract/agreement, license violations and other actions.

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