Wettlaufer in “DAMAGE CONTROL” mode.

Instead of following Dave Worth’s invitation to appear in his Upside Down Show on the community channel, channel 5, in Wales, Wettlaufer wrote a statement which Dave read at the end of his show yesterday evening.
Wettlaufer’s statement does not offer any new facts and falls short of claiming my accusations raised during Dave’s show were incorrect and not truthfull. James Wettlaufer, chairman of the Board of Selectmen, has good reasons to do so. He knows such a statement could come back to haunt him..

As one of the reasons to not be on the Show, Wettlaufer mentions two ongoing Federal Lawsuits initiated by James LaMountain against the town. What in the world have two lawsuits between LaMountain and the Town to do with me?? Or with the Johnson Landgate scandal??
These two lawsuits involve neither me nor the issues surrounding Johnson Landgate.

According to Dave Worth, Wettlaufer and Johnson claim that the voters gave their blessing to a zoning bylaw change that created a right for the Johnsons’ to build on back-lots without frontage. This claim was just voiced during conversations between Dave and Holland town officials and is interestingly not part of Wettlaufer’s statement. The zoning change in question was described on the warrant as:

To remove section “n” of Common Driveway bylaw section 7.8 on p.51.

If you (the reader) are one of those voters who raised his/her paddle, did you know what it was all about? Did you know what you voted for during the special town meeting on Thursday July 28, 2005? Don't you feel betrayed? I hope that it is clear to everybody that the timing was not a coincident. Less than seven months later, the Johnson’s needed “frontage” to build homes on the back lots that had no frontage. See Planning Board Minutes of March 7, 2006.

What did the voters actually do by voting in favor of removing section “n” ?
Section “n” read:

Common driveways shall at no time be used to satisfy zoning frontage requirements. Each lot served shall have lot frontage on a street which serves to satisfy lot frontage requirements.

The text of section “n” did not appear on the Warrant. Johnson and Wettlaufer are right, the voters raised their paddle and section “n” is no longer on the books. They are also right that the Attorney General gave his blessing.

This picture shows the two houses built by Earl Johnson's family.

Just ask your self,
who else can build on a back lot that has no frontage?


HOWEVER, Johnson’s and Wettlaufer’s argument that removing section “n” created a right to use common driveways for frontage is legally not tenable for the following reasons:

The language of section “n” was unnecessary and not required. Mass. General Law (M.G.L.), chapter 41, section 81L is decisive on the question which ways are able to provide frontage; driveways or common driveways are not included, (read paragraph “Subdivision”).

The fact that driveways or common driveways can not provide frontage is outllined in other sections of the Holland by-laws. Section V, footnote (a) on page 17, reads in part:
“Required frontage shall be measured on an accepted public way currently maintained as such, or on a private way which, as determined by a decision of the Planning Board, is in reasonably close conformity with the standards for roads contained in the Rules and Regulations of the Holland Planning Board.”
Does it mention a common driveway Mr. Johnson and Mr. Wettlaufer??

Another section in the Holland by-laws requires lots served by a common driveway to have the same “legal frontage” provided by a “street” as lots not served by a common driveway. Section VII(k) on page 46 provides:
“All lots to be served by a common driveway must meet the requirements of a lot as defined in the bylaws. All dimensional requirements, as defined in the Zoning Ordinance, for lots served by a common driveway, including but not limited to, setback and dimension of front, side and rear yards, as measured in relation to the street serving as the legal frontage for the lots, shall be the same as would be required for those lots had they not shared a common driveway.”
If the lots would not share a common driveway, where would the frontage come from??, Mr. Johnson, Mr. Wettlaufer, please expain!!
Earl Johnson had served as a tax assessor, member of the Planning Board, and member of the Board of selectmen and other Boards for decades. To assume that he did not know better is ludicrous.

Another frontage requirement is included in section VII(e):
“[T]he common driveway shall access the property over the frontage of at least one of the lots being served by the driveway.”
How does that work if the common driveway provides the frontage??
Mr. Johnson or Mr. Wettlaufer, please explain!!

By removing the unnecessary section “n” from the town by-laws which was just intended to clarify a restriction included in M.G.L., the restriction itself is not removed.

The Johnsons’ would like you to believe that the removal of the unnecessary superfluous section “n” which was just reiterating the obvious RESTRICTION in the General Laws would in fact CREATE A NEW RIGHT!
To achieve this, to CREATE A NEW RIGHT, the zoning bylaws would have to be amended with something like this:
“Common driveways can provide leagl frontage in the same way as public ways and private ways by granting of a special permit.”
Such a zoning bylaw amendment would never get approved by the Attorney General, as such a bylaw would be in violation of M.G.L. chapter 41, section 81L.

February 20, 2010, Peter Frei.