To the Editor,

It's clear to me that Rhode Island Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi (D-Warwick) is trying his best to fix that which isn't broken.

In his recent 15 bill package, addressing housing throughout Rhode Island, he is intent on side-stepping local Zoning Boards and taking State control (H-7062).

The motivation is to develop multi-unit housing in areas where it’s never been before. These areas would include business districts and industrial zones.

This is not to mention the possibility of apartment buildings and condominiums, conceivably, in residential areas reserved and designed for single family homes. Imagine, if you will, a second separate house in your next-door neighbor’s backyard. With no Zoning Board to intervene, YES it could happen under this plan.

It’s obvious there’s a shortage of housing throughout Rhode Island and this issue needs to be addressed, but in a thoughtful and precise way. A cookie-cutter approach statewide is no way to cure this problem. What's right for Central Falls or Providence is not what's right for Johnston or Cranston.

This legislation would eliminate the authority of local Boards allowing developers to simply erect multi-unit, or other housing, wherever they want with little or no local permitting. The elimination of local Zoning Boards or the combining of local Planning and Zoning Boards is a thinly veiled means of putting all control in the hands of the State by statute.

Local boards understand their towns, their comprehensive plans and the local neighborhoods. Most importantly, these boards understand the people who live and work there and are accountable to those same people.

Clearly the Speaker’s intent is to override all local control, creating tracts of housing like a runaway train, with no consideration for consistency of local architecture or neighborhood design, but most importantly no consideration for homeowners and businesses.

The Johnston Zoning Board has done a remarkable job of guarding the interests of our town. We dare not put that decision-making responsibility in the hands of the State or remove it by statute. You can imagine how that will turn out.

Let’s remember, these are our neighborhoods, this is our Town and we have the right to plan and shape it free of State interference, the way we see fit.

Richard Fascia, of Johnston

Member of both the Johnston Zoning Board & Johnston Republican Town Committee