CFAL Funding, Airport Study Approved; Voters Endorse RTE Delay

CHATHAM – A round of applause greeted approval of funding to complete the expansion and renovation of the Center for Active Living during Monday’s annual town meeting. After years of disappointment, the town’s seniors will finally get an updated facility that meets their needs.

Voters powered through the 61-article warrant, completing the town’s annual legislative session in just over five hours. The 586 registered voters approved funding for a controversial airport safety study, backed bulkhead replacement projects at two town landings, and endorsed a nonbinding finance committee article urging the select board to wait a year before implementing a residential tax exemption.

Town meeting sent mixed messages regarding affordable housing, approving funding for homeownership units on Stepping Stones Road and rental housing at the former Buckley property, but turning down money for a similar project on Meetinghouse Road (see separate story). Voters also approved $11 million for a new roof at Monomoy Regional Middle School, where the session was held.

A $47,295,970 operating budget, a 4.7 percent increase over the current year’s spending, was approved with little comment. Also approved without comment were $11,737,053 for the town’s share of the Monomoy Regional School District budget; $560,313 for Cape Cod Regional Technical High School; a $5,703,016 water department budget; and a $2,440,500 capital budget.

The additional $200,000 approved for the Center for Active Living (CFAL) supplements $5 million appropriated for the work on the 193 Stony Hill Rd. building last May. The vote capped the council on aging’s years-long effort to build a new facility. After failing to win funding for a new building numerous times, town officials pivoted to expanding and renovating the existing CFAL. The upgraded building will include improved access, a small addition, more functional interior space through removal of interior columns, updated lighting, modernization of the elevator, new siding and windows and an almost doubling of parking, according to architect Kurt Rader.

The measure needed a two-thirds majority to pass due to the inclusion of an easement over neighboring property. In past CFAL votes, that threshold proved impossible to meet, but Monday, voters overwhelmingly approved the additional funds and the easement, 483-66.

Construction is expected to begin by the end of next month. According to a press release from the town, the CFAL will close to the public beginning June 15, and operations will be relocated to the community center by June 19 for the duration of construction. The work is expected to be completed by August 2027.

Always controversial, Chatham Airport was the subject of two articles. One sought $17,500 as the local match to upgrade navigation and lighting equipment, the other requested $4,050 for the town’s share of a study on the use of the airport by large aircraft. Free cash was the funding source for both.

Both address airport safety, said airport commission Chair Huntley Harrison. The town’s contribution to the navigation equipment replacement leverages $682,500 in state and federal funding that will waterproof and replace old wiring and add LED lighting, he said. The work is necessary for safety and to keep the airport up to date and has “nothing to do with increasing the number of flight operations for aircraft that use the airport,” Harrison said.

Michael Tompsett questioned why town funds were being used for what he said was airport maintenance; the money should come from the airport revolving fund, he argued. Pilot Rene Haas countered that the replacement constituted a capital expense and was necessary to meet state and federal grant requirements.

“It doesn’t get any more basic than switching out old incandescent lights for new, brighter, more efficient LED lights,” he said. But resident Bill Glass noted that the request was defeated at last year’s town meeting, and he suggested officials were ignoring the wishes of voters.

“I guess there’s a reliance on voter fatigue to get this over the line,” he said.

The article was approved 374-175.

The study of the use of the airport by so-called Design Group 2 aircraft was triggered by increased flights by turbo-prop planes such as the Pilatus P-12, said Harrison. Chatham’s airport was designed for smaller aircraft, and the study will help determine if safety measures are necessary to accommodate the larger planes, he said. Those measures could involve changes in airport ground operations but will not include any physical expansion, he said. The town’s contribution is 2.5 percent of the total cost of the $142,500 study, with state and federal agencies picking up the rest, he added. 

Airport critics have expressed safety concerns due to the increase in the number of flights by the larger aircraft, and the study will provide “a definitive answer, once and for all, on this issue,” Harrison said.

Tompsett questioned whether the airport could meet the standards for the larger aircraft and whether said waivers, if granted, would endanger homes near the airport. He accused airport consultants of lying to the Federal Aviation Administration about the elevation of nearby Great Hill, leading to planes flying “at rooftop heights.” The town could just as easily ask the FAA to require that larger charter planes land at the Hyannis airport, not Chatham, he said, calling the study “a futile and ridiculous attempt to justify an unsafe and noisy jetport.”

Haas countered that there is no way to physically expand the airport, and that critics should welcome the study as a way to address their safety concerns. The article was approved 369-139.

The select board has voted twice to endorse a residential tax exemption (RTE), which would provide year-round homeowners with a reduction in property taxes, while nonresident owners would pay slightly higher taxes. A 20 percent RTE has been proposed and would have to be officially voted in the fall when the board sets the annual tax rate. Residents have to apply for the RTE, providing specific information to qualify. As of Monday, the assessing department had already received more than 200 applications.

Two articles on the annual warrant addressed the RTE. One sought the addition of $500,000 to the assessors’ overlay fund to cover exemptions and abatements that are filed after the tax rate is set; the other article, submitted by the finance committee, asked the select board to delay implementing the tax policy measure for one year while its implications are studied. The article was advisory and did not bind the select board. 

Voters began to address the overlay request first, but agreed to hold off debate until after the finance committee article. Fincom Chair Stephen Daniel said the panel doesn’t dispute the fact that Chatham has an affordability problem, especially regarding housing. “The desire to do something about it is both admirable and right,” he said. But he questioned whether the RTE is the correct avenue, since wealthy full-time residents would also get the tax break, while renters and some year-round owners who have their property in a trust may not. The select board has failed to define exactly who is targeted with the relief and whether there are other ways to help year-round residents other than a major shift in tax policy, he said.

“None of this is an argument that Chatham should do nothing,” Daniel said. “It is an argument that Chatham should do the right thing.” A year-long delay will allow the fincom to study the issue and develop recommendations, he said.

Chatham’s housing market has changed drastically, said select board member Shareen Davis, creating an imbalance that the RTE seeks to address. Providing a tax break for young families, local workers and others struggling to afford a home in town will help “keep Chatham functioning as a real community, not a vacation destination,” she said.

She noted that Provincetown, Truro, Wellfleet and Nantucket, as well as other towns both on and off Cape, have had the RTE in place, in some cases, for years. “Communities across the Cape are realizing that the traditional property tax system no longer reflects the seasonal housing market,” she said.

Board member Jeffrey Dykens, who supports the RTE, acknowledged that some well-off residents would receive the tax break, but so would seniors on fixed incomes, single-parent households and others for whom $1,000 “represents a welcome and material savings.” Even with nonresidents paying more, Chatham’s tax rate will still be among the lowest in the state, and any changes that require legislation or state approval could take years, he added.

Others called the RTE unfair and divisive. 

“You’re dividing people in town into different groups and you’re taxing them at different rates,” said Glass, who called the measure “a mistake.” Elaine Gibbs said the RTE is unmanageable and an invasion of privacy, a “confiscation and redistribution of taxpayer money.”

But Ron Bergstrom noted that while the town has a year-round population of about 6,500, its infrastructure and town departments are geared toward the summer population estimated at around 30,000. He called for the select board to implement the RTE now.

“We need to do even small steps to encourage year-round people to live in this town,” he said.

Voters approved the finance committee’s nonbinding measure 178-154. Voters turned down the $500,000 increase in the overlay budget, however by just nine votes, 150-159. 

Even though he doesn’t support the RTE, select board Chair Dean Nicastro said adding the funds to the overlay account was “sound fiscal planning.” If the RTE is not implemented, the funds will remain in the overlay account and can be transferred back to the general fund. “We don’t lose that money,” he said.

But David Oppenheim noted that since voters recommended delaying the RTE, it didn’t make sense to appropriate the additional overlay funding at this time. Voters agreed.

Thursday’s town election could be a deciding factor in whether the RTE is implemented this fall. Previous select board votes endorsing the RTE have seen the board split 3-2. Davis, who supports the RTE, is not running, so whoever replaces her will be the swing vote. All four candidates running for the seat have said they support the RTE, at least in concept, but some have said they also support the delay.

Borrowing $11 million for a new roof for the Monomoy Regional Middle School was approved. With a $3.7 million contribution from the Massachusetts School Building Authority, the local cost of the project is estimated at $8 million. Based on the funding formula in the regional school agreement, Chatham’s share will be $1.8 million, while Harwich — which approved the funding at last week’s town meeting and will vote on exempting the debt May 19 — will be $6.1 million. Chatham will cover the borrowing costs through its school appropriation and therefore does not need to hold an override vote for the funds.

Chatham voters will, however, address two borrowing requests at today’s annual town election: $2 million to replace the bulkhead at Barn Hill town landing and $3.5 million to replace ramps and the bulkhead at the Ryder’s Cove town landing. Both passed unanimously at town meeting.

Voters also approved $280,000 for new financial software; $400,000 for dredging; $200,000 for the town’s childcare voucher program; $100,000 in community preservation money to help fund a new homeless shelter in Hyannis; and community preservation funding to restore a radio tower at the Marconi-RCA property as well as restoration of the Mack Memorial and harbormaster’s building and funds to upgrade Kate Gould Park.

A petition article to require residential irrigation systems on private wells to comply with emergency water restrictions failed 110-133. A bylaw that would have required the select board to conduct an analyst before adopting state statutes under its authority also failed, 97-158.