[The following commentary first appeared as a series of three articles in May and June 1997, in the Milford Cabinet. It was written by George Bower, an member of the Amherst Planning Board. It appears here with the permission of Mr. Bower.]
Over the past several weeks, readers of the local newspapers have been treated to a series of articles and letters describing various views on the good and bad about living in Amherst. We were warned about the dark future and introduced to a possible future, as well as exposed to musing about taxes, kindergarten and high schools, apathy, voting and other matters.
I believe that it is time for someone to offer the more pragmatic observations and background facts that are being overlooked amid all of the shooting and ducking. In this series, I want to present my assessment of the most pressing issues facing the town and offer suggestions on how we can best address the issues and retain the features of Amherst that we view as important. Opinion or conjecture have too often been represented as fact. There are important issues and fundamental problems facing the town that are not being discussed.
No one writes letters to the editor and guest features without some motivation. I firmly believe in using local government (the town and school) to influence the future of the town in which we and others will live. The many things we cherish about Amherst did not develop by accident but rather by concerned citizens taking well planned, positive actions.
I have little time for the diss'ers (the disenchanted, disaffected, disagreeable, disingenuous, dissident) who stand on the sideline complaining and believe that we can solve all the problems if we 'just say no'. I also have little sympathy for the those whose sole involvement in their town is to complain for 30 days before and after Town Meeting. I suspect that the "too many good reasons that voters can not and will not attend public meetings" are the same reasons for not being involved in the lives of our children, working with a recreation department team, volunteering in the schools, attending church, visiting our parents or family. . . .
The greatest amount of public discussion in recent weeks has focused on: 1) the interrelationships of population growth and public expenditures for education and Town services; and, 2) the use of ballot voting to address the problems in the Town. Ironically, these two issues are related and their solutions will have a direct bearing on how the Town evolves in the future. Prior discussions have failed to accurately define these two issues and completely avoided what I see as broader problems.
Population has grown only nominally over the past five years in Amherst but at the same time, the population distribution has changed and property taxes have increased in terms of actual dollars. The vast majority of the tax increase has been felt by residential property owners because of a tax base that is skewed toward residential property. What is not well known is that non-residential property taxes have increased very little or not at all since 1993.
Ballot voting, in one form or another, is being represented as the panacea for the Town's ills. Were it only so simple as voting for or against a budget to solve the problems! Voting is an effective mechanism for selecting one option over another but voting does not devise solutions. In the case of ballot voting, it is heavily weighted toward voting against things. Despite its good elements, SB-2 was designed to make defeating government actions very easy and passing budgets and government actions difficult. Expanding the mechanism to the majority of voters who opt not to participate in Town government gives the public a greater voice but it does not get you any closer to solving the problems.
Behind the problems facing the town are complex influences that we need to fully understand if we are make intelligent decisions about the present and future. My assessment of these is outlined below. No significance should be given to the order.
Problem #1 - Growth. Like other towns in the northeast, Amherst is growing. This should not come as a surprise after the housing depression that began in the late 80's. Growth over the past 3 years has been remarkable, while the average growth of the past 10 years has been just that -- average. But unexpected growth came in the rate of increase of the school age populations; almost three times the projected rate. But then good schools in New Hampshire attract good students. The same is true for other institutions -- look at Microsoft, MIT, Polaroid, the Atlanta Braves, etc.
Growth projections have never been very accurate. The smaller the population unit that you try to predict, the greater the error - simple statistics. The statistics that Amherst and the schools have used in past projections assumed straight line increases. The method was appropriate, however, it proved to be inaccurate. Today, background considerations in making growth estimates have changed to the degree that the method is no longer appropriate either.
Here is some background on the growth issue not addressed in earlier commentary: there is a finite supply of developable land in the town. The town can not continue to grow at its present rate through 2010 (100+ new homes per year), as has been predicted. There is not enough remaining developable land to support half that number of new homes.
There are about 300 approved house lots that could be built today and another 1000 +/- acres of buildable land. Unless zoning changes are made, there are only 500-600 existing and potential building lots remaining. Most of Amherst's undeveloped land is in the Northern Rural zone where the minimum lot size is 5 acres. Even if all developable land was in the 2 acre residential/rural zone, only 700 +/- lots remain.
Amherst is approaching its capacity for single family homes. The situation is similar to that experienced in mature suburbs where the population is stable. When potential new homes are added to the 3000+ homes that already exist, we are looking at a town with approximately 3700 single family housing units at buildout and a total population of 15,000 +/-. Given constant economic conditions, growth should continue for 4-6 more years and then level off substantially.
Much attention has been paid to the fact that empty-nester homes are being purchased by families. Once the buildout occurs, and it will, population growth will level off. The empty-nester syndrome is cyclical, it is generational and it is profoundly influenced by housing costs. The construction of new homes will dampen housing values until the supply diminishes, after which, values could soar. Then the escalation of property values created by the buildout will likely remove from the market the young families who are today creating the increase in school age populations.
This situation has very important implications for future capital expenditures. Regardless of how you cut it, all three schools are at or over capacity today and will not accommodate the population increase of 500-700 new homes. If we build additional space to solve the current overcrowding and the likely population through the next 7-10 years, it should not be necessary to build school space beyond that horizon. Town facilities, with the exception of recreational facilities and possibly Town Hall, should suffice without expansion. Public safety functions (fire, police, rescue and highways) also will not require significant expansion to meet demands. If the Town turns to a full-time fire department, it will not have been necessitated by growth.
Problem # 2 - Educational Costs. Most people have attributed the increases in their tax bills to spending by the schools and that is partially correct. Others have been very vocal in attributing the increase in taxes to mismanagement of the school budget and this is incorrect.
The increase in the school budgets has been virtually parallel to the increase in students. Each new student means that an additional $6300 must be collected in taxes to pay school costs. The $6300 per pupil cost placed Amherst at or below about 20% of the school districts in the state in 1994-95. The Amherst School District (K-8) was ranked 44/162 statewide in terms of per pupil cost and Souhegan (9-12) was ranked 12/162. The state-wide average for K-12 was $5242 and ranged as high as $9375.
Every time a new house is built or an existing house sold and occupied by a mythical average family with 1.7 children, the town/schools collects an average of $6000 in property taxes and spends $10,700 in school costs alone. The difference is spread out over all of the other property tax payers. For better or worse, in this state we raise local revenues through property taxes. The problem is not how much is being spent but how tax burden has been shifted since 1993 and how less tax revenue is now contributed by the commercial and industrial tax base.
Problem #3 - Commercial/Industrial Tax Base. In the 1993 town-wide reassessment commercial property values declined substantially and shifted a portion of the overall tax burden to residential properties. What has been overlooked in the town/school tax debate is that the portion of the $6300 educational cost paid by the homeowner has increased due to the decrease in commercial property valuation. In 1993 there was a 10 point shift in the valuation of taxable property from commercial/industrial to residential.
As a percent of all property value from 1993 to 1996, residential values went from 82% to 87% and commercial/industrial fell from 17% to 12%. For every $1000 in property taxes collected, the share paid by homeowners has risen from $820 to $870 and the share paid by commercial/industrial owners has declined from $170 to $120. A typical residential tax bill of $6000 increased by $300 per year with no change in spending. The shift will occur again this year due to ruling that removed $2,570,000 from the Town's commercial/industrial valuation by exempting the telephone company from property taxes.
Commercial and industrial properties offset residential tax loads. Real estate property tax pressures will continue to exist until the town finds a way to attract new business or reassesses commercial properties. You might ask "what is being done to attract new businesses to Amherst?" It is not simple but the answer is nothing.
Part 1 in this series on the Town of Amherst looked at growth and taxes. In Part 2, this long-time Planning Board member reviews development, environmental, citizen apathy and leadership issues that are confronting the town.
Lack of Sewer Service. Commercial and industrial development locates in areas served by a sewer. Amherst has no sewer service, no plan for linking to another sewer and no plans to build its own. Further, the Souhegan River has no capacity for another sewer plant given the Milford plant and Milford has refused to consider an Amherst link. The options are limited. Unless and until the Town develops wastewater treatment capabilities, commercial and industrial development will continue to locate in other area towns. And Amherst will continue to fund the vast majority of its budget through residential property tax assessments.
Development of a Long Term Commercial/Industrial Plan. Under a best case scenario, significant commercial/industrial development is off on a three to five year horizon. None of the big name companies expanding or locating in southern New Hampshire are coming to Amherst. The town will be a prime residential location though. The tax impact of residential development was discussed in last weeks article. A recent zoning change proposed by the Planning Board opened up industrial land to retail development in an effort to address this problem. Retail stores, like Walmart, can operate on septic systems rather than sewer systems. This is only a stop-gap measure though and the Town needs to plan for and recruit new businesses. The tradeoff of the zoning change is the additional traffic on RT-101A. Good if you are a business, negative if you are a resident commuting to Nashua or south.
Environmental Threat of the Landfills. The town has two landfills and both have been problems for the last ten years. The unlined pits hold residential and industrial wastes from Amherst and area towns. Landfills, unlike a good wine, do not get better with age. One already leaks and the other is not even monitored. Private wells provide drinking water to 85% of the town and there is substantial residential development around both landfills. Building Souhegan High School cost $12.5 million and is bonded over 20 years. Cleaning up the landfills in town is potentially a bigger cost.
Water Supply. Amherst relies on its aquifers and one outside utility (Pennichuck) for the majority of its water. Contamination already exists in the aquifers under RT-101A and RT-101. The Town has no long term plan for water supply and no backup source has been reserved. See the discussion on the landfills above to understand a potential problem. Clean, reliable water supplies are the single most important resource in the world today. The town has no contingency plan and no plans to address one.
Maintaining High Quality Education. I think that it is essential for Amherst to view the importance of its educational system in a context other than cost for a few moments. Quality of education is the number one reason people buy houses in Amherst. Ask any new resident the top five reasons they located here and they will probably tell you: 1) schools, 2) schools, 3) schools, 4) quality of life and 5) proximity to the Boston/Nashua metro area. Quality education is the dominant factor in Amherst residential property values because the reputation of the Amherst schools is what is driving housing sales and prices. If we manage to trash the reputation of the schools, the demand for housing will disappear and property values will take a beating.
The education level of parents is one of the best predictors of student success. And the success of a school system is one of the strongest predictors of future property values in New Hampshire. The best available case study for the relationship between schools and real estate values is directly across the town line in Merrimack. After the School Board takeover by members of the religious right, demand for houses in Merrimack dropped to near zero. Ask your new neighbor why they moved to Amherst rather than Merrimack.
Citizen Apathy. Amherst is viewed as a very desirable community. People move here and live here for quality of life reasons. The majority of the contributors who made Amherst a very desirable community were volunteers. If you look at the towns throughout the US that have positive reputations, you will find high levels of citizen involvement. This is no surprise. The best managed companies in America, the most successful non-profits, the most productive service organizations, the most effective schools, all have broad scale, meaningful participation by the stake-holders.
Volunteerism is far from dead in Amherst, though it is changing. The Amherst PTA develops and manages a broad range of educational activities and raises over $40,000 each year to support the elementary and middle school programs. Parents have volunteered almost 7000 hours at Clark, Wilkins and the Middle School this year. The Garden Club contributes funds to local projects and its members maintain most of the public gardens and landscaped ares of the town. Amherst Junior Women's Club raises almost $20,000 for community programs and volunteers countless hours. This does not even address very successful Boy Scout, Girl Scout, Recreation Department and service organization programs.
What is changing is citizen's willingness to serve on town boards in an increasingly divisive atmosphere created by the 'me' generation. All of our boards operate in a setting that is more technically demanding and confrontational than it was only ten years ago. Decisions are crafted as much to avoid law suits as to ensure fair process or to act in the best interest of the town.
Many volunteers are also looking for shorter term and less critical assignments than what most town boards require. Learning the ins and outs of the Board of Selectmen, Zoning Board or Planning Board takes three to five years. It is no exaggeration to say that these boards deal with the same issues as the executive, judicial and legislative branches of the federal government. But unlike the federal level, local board members invariably know all of the parties that their decisions affect and must live with the results.
The difference between town government and other governmental entities is the role of citizens in defining and implementing the plans that make the community. The basis of town government is citizen action. The basis for city government voting by its citizens. If we want to maintain the characteristics of a New England town, we have to act like one.
Amherst will become another bedroom community when we cease having Town and school district meetings, diminish the significance of volunteers and make decisions with an impersonal X in the voting booth rather than a raised hand at a meeting. It takes substantially more personal effort to make a difference and implement plans through citizen participation than to express your opinion through voting. New Englanders led a revolution in the late 1700's for the right to participate in government, not just to vote. Now we are engaged in a fight over the way to spend five minutes voting so we do not have to expend any effort to participate.
The Leadership Vacuum. The majority of the real problems we face are a direct result of changes in society or events outside of the Town. In terms of the schools, we are experiencing the impacts of their considerable success and the problems of surrounding school systems. Town government has to compete for a scarce local resource: our time. You can not control the outside influences but strong leadership can mitigate their negative impacts.
Amherst has five governmental boards that directly or indirectly influence your pocketbook, property and living environment. These are the selectmen, the planning board, the zoning board and two school boards.
The foremost town board is the Selectmen. Their role is to provide leadership on tough, everyday, town-wide issues and to help focus the Town on meaningful progress on its long term problems. Amherst is fortunate to have capable administrators and department heads who are fully able to conduct the business of the town. Too much time has been spent micro-managing one side or another of important issues, rather than in the middle finding solutions.
The role of the Selectmen is also to find common ground for competing interests and issues, like ballot voting, not to politicize them. Rather than create division and court voting constituencies, the Selectmen's responsibility is to define solutions that are in the best long-term interest of the Town. Conjecture and rhetoric differ greatly from solutions.
Unfortunately, to date, the real problems have been caught in a leadership vacuum. This is not as much a criticism as it is a recognition of the time limits of volunteers. The majority of board members serve on two boards and several committees. There is cross-representation; some of it by design. But there is no regularly scheduled meeting for representatives of the five boards to plan or discuss issues.
The end result of the leadership vacuum is that momentum has been on the side of doing nothing while the problems under our control continue to exist or grow worse. Town government is not supposed to operate like the federal government.
Many people have asked me over the past several years about what can be done to retain the character of the town in the presence of its growth. Several questions keep coming up time and again. How much growth can the town accommodate? Can we control growth? Are our taxes going to continue to escalate? How do we maintain the high quality of life that this town offers?
These are healthy questions and we need to address them today. 95% of the people I talk with like what they see in this town. But they also recognize what uncontrolled growth can do.
The town is fortunate to have a solid base on which to build. Amherst has a strong history of carefully planning for its future and acting on its plans. We have not done a good job during the last decade of acting on plans though. And we do not have the luxury on continued inaction. My recommendations on dealing with the most significant issues are presented in this final part of the series.
All of the indicators say that the town is going to continue to grow and produce a shift in demographics. Our challenge is to find ways to channel the growth and reduce the demands on services and the school systems. There are four available options, of which the later two hold the most promise.
First, change the zoning to larger lot sizes to reduce the number of future, buildable lots. Unfortunately, most developable land is in the Northern Rural zone where the minimum lot size is 5 acres; that is, five acres after subtracting wetlands and severe slopes.
Second, implement a growth management plan to limit of new development. Under NH law this is difficult to accomplish. Amherst has been advised by Town Counsel that when growth controls are really effective, they are probably not legal.
Third, the most effective way to prevent growth is to buy the land and remove it from the market. Spending $1MM today to purchase land and/or development rights and thereby removing 50 building lots from the market would save the taxpayers as much as $225,000 per year by avoiding school costs. By purchasing development rights the town controls the development of the land and the owner retains its use. The town could smooth out the growth curve by purchasing land/rights today and selling it in the future.
Fourth, provide incentives to land owners and builders to develop uses that do not attract school age populations. This includes commercial and industrial development, elderly housing, condominiums and apartments. Nine out of ten building permits issued today are for four bedroom, single family homes.
Ten years ago Amherst had on the books incentives for developments that were not single family homes. Incentives are major factors in creating developments such as Atherton Commons, the town's best example of low impact housing. The incentives were deleted by citizens who did not feel that condominiums fit their image of the town. Since that time, there has not been a single, significant low impact development built in Amherst. Well designed incentives need to be instituted to encourage development that adds to the tax base without adding to the school population.
As discussed earlier, school budget increases have been driven by the increase in school age population. Short of finding some way to prevent people from moving to Amherst, there are few options. The solutions are in increasing the commercial/industrial tax base and in promoting residential development that minimizes the growth in the school population.
The town needs to revisit its position on the implementation of impact fees to recover part of the capital cost of new school construction. There is no denying that increases in school age populations are creating the need to build additional space. A school impact fee would be applied to each developable building lot in the town. In this way new construction would pay its share of the cost of providing facilities for the 1000 +/- students who will be added to the school system. Impact fees would provide revenue that would otherwise not be generated. In order to obtain maximum revenue, they need to be implemented sooner rather than later.
There are those who believe that cost containment can be achieved simply by cutting the budgets of the schools. The property value risk inherent to this strategy is very substantial though. The budget increases have been due to more students and actions taken 10 years ago to eliminate the incentives to build housing that did not impact the schools. If you are looking for a simple, short term solution, there is none.
The ratio of residential to commercial/industrial tax base in Amherst is simply out of whack. The town needs three times the existing commercial/industrial tax base to reach a reasonable ratio. The recent zoning change to allow retail development in the industrial zone is the first of several essential steps.
Development of a wastewater treatment facility or connection to an existing plant is the single most important action that can be taken to promote commercial/industrial development. The installation of a sewer in the commercial/industrial zone has been an agenda item for more than 10 years.
Finding a way to tie into Merrimack or Nashua, providing incentives to businesses that will build their own wastewater treatment facilities, or negotiating a sewer connection with Milford are the near term solutions. Numerous other options have already been studied.
The economic benefits to the town are substantial but the taxpayers will have to be willing to shoulder the capital cost of the facility. This requires they be convinced the benefits are real and that there is a competent plan to attract businesses. The town must form a commercial/industrial development commission to actively recruit new businesses and consider hiring a professional to manage the job.
Virtually all of the regional transportation improvements needed for commercial development are circumventing Amherst. Our highway infrastructure is adequate for projected residential development but it will not support buildout of the commercial/industrial zone. Amherst lost out on the RT-101A by-pass that would have served the commercial/industrial zone. Now the town needs to find some way to get back into the ten year que for infrastructure improvements to support meaningful development.
The town also needs changes to its zoning to foster the incubation of new businesses by people who already live here. There is currently a gap between what is allowed as a home occupation and the level of business activity that is needed for the transition to a stand-alone business.
Finally, serious consideration needs to be given to reassessing the commercial/industrial properties to bring their assessments in line with the existing real estate and business climate. The economic conditions that brought about the tax shift are no longer present.
The old landfill is a town problem. It is unlined and not monitored. The regional landfill belongs to four towns but impacts Amherst. One cell of the regional landfill is unlined and it is leaking. Stringent management and monitoring of both landfills today is critical if the town is to avoid costly problems in the future.
The vast majority of water supply in Amherst is in the deep and shallow aquifers. Identifying and setting aside areas today for well head protection means that future development will not destroy the remaining well sites and will not subject the Town to negotiating for water rights at a time of urgent need.
Participation in town affairs does not have to take a great deal of time, nor does it require direct involvement. Your participation is essential to local officials who all too often have to make decisions without any public comment. All town board meetings are open to the public and every board and commission needs volunteers. You do not have to be a member to attend meetings, participate or work with one of the boards or commissions.
Increasing citizen involvement means that town government and the public must make some changes. We have read that the town needs to do a better job of educating citizens about important issues. It clearly needs to do a better job but this is a two way street. The problem is that to get better public information we must ask volunteers to give even more time.
On the part of the town, developing a web site could go a long way toward making information more readily available. For the part of citizens, attend a meeting of Selectmen, the Planning Board or one of the School Boards to learn who your local officials are. Ask to be placed on a list to receive the Selectmen's, Planning Board's and School Board's minutes and submit comments in writing.
In 1946 Amherst began to implement the zoning and planning process that has resulted in the community we live in today. The Master Plan is the blue print for the town. Take the time to read the chapter on goals and objectives and you will understand that the features of the town that brought or keep you here were planned.
This document is updated every 10 years. This summer the Planning Board will hold hearings to discuss the update and what the future should look like. Master planning is the single most important process to help define what should be preserved or discarded. The Master Plan covers the philosophy of the town, forms of development, the environment, conservation, transportation, resources, etc.
You can participate in updating the plan either by attending the hearings or by writing to the Planning Board. The hearings will discuss philosophy and strategy. Copies are available at Town Hall and in the library.
Getting leadership on moving forward is crucial. In fact, leadership will be the difference between successfully dealing with the growth that the town will experience or succumbing to it. The town is at a crossroad where it can build on its rich heritage or degenerate into a Merrimack-like conflict.
Moving forward means several important things have to happen. First, the Selectmen have to take the lead and start to address long term problems today. They need to put a high priority on commercial/industrial development, long term management of the tax base, and resolution of the SB-2 conflict. If the Selectmen are not willing to use their office to resolve conflicts that are detrimental to the town, they should vacate it.
Second, there must be substantially more interaction and communication between the town boards and the school boards. If and when school expansion becomes a necessity, the tax impact needs to be structured to be as painless as possible. This is only going to be possible with joint fiscal planning. The Ways and Means Committee should consider evolving to provide fiscal policy coordination.
Third, try to look at the town from the standpoint of the 5 to 18 year olds who live here. The largest increase in population will be in this age group. We offer some great adult oriented and managed programs for them. We do not offer enough supervised alternatives to reduce the risks that our society is posing.
Fourth, acting now is more important than acting later. Planning for the future of the town is like planning your retirement. The longer you wait, the greater the problem.
Finally, meaningful participation is central to town government. And participation means more than just voting. If you want to live in a city, vote and go on your merry way. If you like the town you live in, participate in its government and schools. We will either learn to function as a town in the 21st century or we risk becoming another impersonal bedroom community.
Comments can be emailed to the author at bower1@compuserve.com.
You can also read Can Amherst Afford to Pay the Toll On the Bridge to the Twenty-First Century? by Richard Verrochi.
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Last updated by SWC on 8 June 1997