To: The Joint Committee on
Bonding, Capital Expenditures & State Assets
February 13, 2008
CLT hopes that the Legislature will not create more
"independent" entities until the Commonwealth has found a
way to deal with the fiscal problems of the existing
"independent" agencies like the Mass Turnpike Authority and
the MBTA.
We understand the original reason for creating "independent"authorities:
to let elected officials wash their hands of responsibility
when things go wrong. But we suspect citizens see it
all as one big government that so often doesn’t work, and
the governor and legislators as its most visible
representatives.
The 40T District "developers in lieu of government" exist
outside of the voter-controlled local government system,
issuing tax-exempt bonds and collecting "assessments" from
those who buy homes in their district. While it is
true that the buyers should know what they are getting into,
we have noticed that "caveat emptor" didn’t work with the
sub-prime mortgage market.
We appreciate that the "eminent domain" language was removed
from the original stealth legislation, and that we are now
getting public hearings and more legislative input.
But we find it hard to trust people who would even think of
putting it in there and quietly slipping the bill through,
in the first place. Eventually, we suspect, they will
get the eminent domain power they wanted, and the homeowners
abutting the new development will be threatened. Even
with the present legislation, the minority property owners –
the 20% that do not want to be included in this "quasi
government" – will be assessed despite their objections and,
as nearly as we can tell, could lose their homes if the
developers default.
There are already provisions to get betterment payments for
services that benefit only a limited area of property
owners, keeping the process in the hands of elected local
officials.
With the current market, there is no need to make this
legislation a priority. Regardless if who is elected
President, we are already experiencing "change" – and it’s
happening too fast for most of us to control. Let’s
not "change" the structure of local government until we are
sure we haven’t passed another law of unintended results.