Letters

The exhumation of Concern for Independent Living’s compromised application for a zone change for affordable housing on County Road 39 offers a moment to right a grievous wrong.

In October 2022, the town and Ralph Fasano staged a public hearing that descended, as planned, into an acrimonious, pathetic and ultimately dangerous fiasco.

Busloads of veterans, some disabled and suffering from a range of afflictions, were commandeered onto buses by Fasano and driven here, filling the boardroom, to plead with, or vilify, the attendees. All legitimate issues were attacked as NIMBYism or hostility to housing impaired veterans. This disposed of the local affordable housing issue and that Liberty Gardens was a facility.

People cried, protested, indignantly argued among themselves, and fistfights were provoked. Michael Daly, the bully at the pulpit, accused all. Both the veterans and the public are owed an apology for this shamelessness.

The underlying prize is the huge increase in density, overdevelopment and contracts to service the facility.

Jay Schneiderman hustled this as a solution to a “local workforce housing crisis” and a way to “ease traffic.”

Both he and Fasano knew that the funding came from Fasano’s partnership with the State Office of Mental Health in programs providing “affordable housing with supportive services and treatment programs operated to meet the physical and social needs of persons with disabilities, veterans, homeless and low-income families.”

Concern’s mission statements also include “social needs of persons with psychiatric disabilities” — a stipulation they delete when the need suits them.

By accepting marketing studies instead of legal verification of eligibility restrictions from Concern and the State Office of Mental Health, and by not acknowledging the thousands on “client lists” poised to apply, provided to the town by multiple not-for profits, rehabs, etc., the town perpetuates evasion.

Do these people deserve decent housing, a decent chance and any support society can offer? The answer is yes.

However, when a facility such as this is proposed, it must be presented with full disclosure and honestly to the public affected by it, and put to a referendum so the public can vote on it. Not handled in the sleazy way it was done here.

Schneiderman and Fasano equivocated and lied by omission; the town did little due diligence (excepting Cyndi McNamara), while the overpaid planning personnel issued coy statements.

Concern suddenly dropped from view when reports of crime, vandalism, pleas for increased police protection and a fatal shooting emerged at another Fasano site in Medford. Reemerging now before Schneiderman exits, unaccountable for consequences.

This is a rare back-to-the-future moment. The board can make amends to the public by rejecting Liberty Gardens definitively.

And the public can see their future looming if Schneiderman’s shoddy maneuvering prevails.

Frances Genovese

Southampton