Dear Editor,
Thanks for your objective covering of the July 19th Public Hearing on the proposal to re-zone a portion of the East Side of Riverside Drive. Certainly the opposition made a strong case against the proposal well supported by out of town experts but it was filled with inaccuracies and exaggerations. Mr. Campbell’s calling the club’s members thuggish was certainly not called for and demands an apology. Webster defines a thug as a brutal ruffian or assassin, gangster, or killer. The only action close to that was when unprovoked, Mr. John Moran senior physically assaulted me while screaming “you’ll never re-build your yacht club”. Tiverton Police took him away in handcuffs.
Mr. Campbell and several of his witnesses claimed we could have re-built the club house immediately after the fire if we only followed the law. That is an outlandish mis-statement of the facts. Since the club is within 200 feet of the water rebuild requires not only DEM and building inspector approvals, but CRMC approvals all of which take time, particularly when at each step the neighbors made demands which had to be satisfied before we could get those approvals. Mr. Campbell has even filed a suit against the director of CRMC for being too lenient with us. Two years ago when we were preparing to build the DEM approved septic system, he sought and got a court order to cease.
The claim that the property is a dump is ridiculous. Does he expect us to fill the hole and plant grass and shrubs when we expect to re-build? Actually, Jim and Dee Rogers have planted a nice garden in front of the property so it’s appealing to passer-bys.
The claim that our original marina parking plan was purposely fraudulent cannot be verified. The plan was prepared by a certified engineer 25 years ago. None of the present board members had anything to with it. The claim that we built the marina without getting approvals before the fact is also unsubstantiated. We have copies of all the approvals. I’m sick of hearing our membership being called frauds, thugs and untrustworthy.
While Mr. Campbell’s claim that the zone change will benefit only the TYC is partially true; it is also true that it will not adversely impact the rest of the neighborhood. The zone change will make 9 off the 12 lots in the zone conforming by dimension versus the 4 that are currently compliant. Also, by benefitting TYC, the change will allow us to exist and thereby benefit a large number of other Tiverton residents.
Much of the adverse testimony claimed the TYC was planning expansion. That, of course, is untrue. We would certainly like to get up to our by-law maximum of 200 memberships. In 1964 we were at 224. We are currently about 144. The clubhouse we proposed had the same outside dimensions as the structure that burned down. We did want to close in part of the 1st floor perimeter and have a porch on the second floor, again like the house that burned down. Unfortunately the judge ruled (we believe erroneously) that that was not permissible. That and other matters is being contested at the Supreme Court.
Mr. Campbell then claimed that we have no intension of re-building since in his view we’ve spent all our money on legal fees and won’t be able to get financing .(most likely his plan) It’s all about saving the marina, he says. That is just not the case. While all our insurance money has gone to lawyers, we currently have a significant balance and, of course, own valuable property including our marina that can be used as collateral and current and former members willing to contribute to re-building.
In his testimony, Mr. Charles Moran made an interesting point, namely that re-zoning could be done to correct a mistake in original zoning. It appears to me that since in 1964 TYC owned two pieces of property across the street from one another, a mistake was made to zone one waterfront commercial and the other residential when they were intimately tied together.
Virtually all Mr. Campbell’s witnesses testified that they wanted to see the Yacht Club re-build. With the Council’s support of the proposed zoning change at their August 10th meeting at Tiverton High School we will be happy to oblige.
John F. Brady , PhD (not a thug)
Portsmouth RI