The Following letter by Seth Teller was sent to our city councilors. I reprint it here, with permission, because Seth does such a great job encapsulating the negligence of Cambridge city agencies and departments in representing the interests of the East Cambridge neighborhood against those of a private developer.

Dear Councilors,

The residents of Cambridge, and the Council itself, have been terribly served by the various City departments and agencies on the Sullivan Courthouse matter.

The Community Development Department has been mostly absent throughout the process. Apart from some minor comments around the edges of the proposal, we haven’t seen any informed pushback to the misinformation the developer has been spreading over the City: the questionable traffic studies, the garage parking study, the wind study, and the lighting impact study. The developer didn’t even mention, in their application to the City, the anticipated impact on surface parking in East Cambridge. They didn’t even mention the anticipated impact on residents’ privacy. Did the City or any of its agencies call them on any of this? No.

The Traffic and Parking Department certified, quickly and in writing, the Developer’s proposal to long-term lease 420 parking spaces in the municipal garage. Yet after months of wrangling, we citizens were able to analyze the City’s actual parking data. It shows without any doubt that the garage is headed for full occupancy, even “without” any development at the Courthouse. How could your T&P department have gotten this basic fact so wrong?

Meanwhile, the City Solicitor’s opinion on the critical legal question underpinning the proposal is nothing more than a parroting of the developer’s attorney’s assertions. She did not even acknowledge the existence of a contrary opinion by a nationally-known land-use attorney hired by us citizens. There is no more polite way to say it: this is dereliction of duty.

Councilors, there are myriad technical objections to the current proposal. And there are serious legal objections as well; we maintain that the Planning Board simply doesn’t have the right to grant this permit. But beyond the technical and legal objections, there’s the overarching moral question: should the State of Massachusetts be allowed to discharge the debt it incurred in the 1970’s on the backs of today’s Cambridge residents alone?

Here’s how this story could continue, if only the Planning Board, and the City Council, could find the courage to stand up and say to the State, “This process is simply unacceptable. You cannot take a planning disaster from the 1960’s and 1970’s, which all agree was allowed to be built ‘only because of state supremacy,’ and perpetuate that disaster forever by transferring the site to private ownership.”

Folks, as representatives and residents of our City, it is time to take a stand here. Let’s use every means at our disposal to send this completely inappropriate proposal back to the State, and back to the drawing board. Yes, that will likely mean waiting for the next Governor and her or his administration. But they can’t do any worse than the current administration, who have stonewalled us at every turn. And there’s a reasonable chance that they will do better.

We’ve lived with this monstrosity for four decades. Let’s take a few more years to get it right. Let’s block this proposal with every tool we have, and put the State on notice that their current RFP and sale process is a dead duck. They simply must issue a new RFP that states explicitly that whatever is to be built in the City of Cambridge, by a private developer, shall respect the City’s zoning ordinances. Meanwhile, on our end, let’s convene a grand conversation among all citizens of the City about what ought to be done with the site, as part of the Master Planning process that has been so much discussed of late. (A useful precursor to that conversation would be to hold the next Planning Board hearing in East Cambridge, so that the residents most directly affected, including many seniors who were here before the Courthouse was built, can weigh in.)

That’s the process that should have been followed from the start. We’ve lost a few years and dissipated a lot of energy getting to this point. We can’t get the time back, but we can avoid wasting all that good work. It’s not too late to fix this situation, but correcting it will require the Council to step up and take a stand against this outrageous proposal and the process that produced it.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Seth Teller
281 Hurley Street

 Something Is Out Of Alignment

We’ve reached a moment in time where city agencies like Community Development, Traffic, and the City Solicitor, appear to be out of alignment with the needs and vision of Cambridge’s neighborhoods and citizens.

Seth’s letter illustrates not only the bias of city agencies toward development, but also the frustration that many of us have in attempting to protect Cambridge’s unique quality of life, affordability and diversity. Pro-development advocates have been all over this proposed Courthouse renovation, bobbing their heads up and down as if it represents the best chance we’ll ever get to extract a good deal from the developer. Why fight it, they seem to ask, when playing nice will still give us some leverage? And who can blame them for looking at it that way, once you see our city agencies wagging their tails and licking the developer’s hand? With the CDD, Traffic and Parking Department, and City Solicitor all seeming to roll over and play dead in the face of the state and the developer’s arguments, we are left with a group of understandably outraged citizens standing alone in their fight to have Cambridge’s legal zoning laws enforced. Citizens who wish our city agencies would STOP being so ludicrously helpful to our adversaries. Yes, I call them “adversaries,” as I would call any developer who seeks to impose his or her will against our zoning laws or the best interests of our neighborhoods.

I’ve wondered for some time about this almost gleeful rush on the part of the CDD and T&P to support developers’ demands. I mean, why would T&P certify the sale of parking spaces to the developer when the city already has need and use of those parking spaces? I ask that at the same time realizing this is the same T&P that never seems to have a problem certifying additional construction and traffic congestion for the Fresh Pond and Alewife neighborhoods. Just who is it exactly who is setting the mission for these departments? And isn’t it time that mission was re-examined?

I used to think it was our former City Manager who was playing the tune, and the ultimate reason why all city departments were so strongly and reflexively pro-development. But Healey’s gone and the tune keeps playing. Could it be his ghost…?

How many courthouses, 18-story towers and shoe-horned Alewife developments must we endure before our CDD, T&P and City Solicitor start to realize they work for us—today’s Cambridge residents, rich and poor—and not for the affluent thousands who will one day populate those oversized developments they keep facilitating?