The subtle turning of Milford into Manchester..

The subtle turning of Milford into Manchester..

Over the past few year years there has been a flurry of ordinances passed every year on the town ballot. Typically they have endless changes to sign ordinances for nuances that most don’t understand. However every so often there are planning and zoning changes that will... affect people down the road that they don’t realize. Terms like mixed used, affordable housing and housing town master plan don’t seem to raise much concern and they really shouldn’t unless they begin to adversely affect the town. Let’s do some explanation on some of these terms.
Mixed use means that you can have a residential complex right next to a commercial building in an area that was typically zoned for only commercial. Sounds ok on the surface, unless it’s a low end apartment complex that that somebody squeezed into a small lot with an absentee landlord who only cares about a check and not the town. However with the changed ordinances it’s totally ok and planning can’t do a thing about it. Affordable housing is another one.
Let’s be clear, Milford does not have a low income housing problem. Milford has in fact the best mix of low, middle of high income housing in the surrounding 13 towns. Anybody who is telling you there is a shortage of low income housing in Milford is a fallacy. Affordable housing is a term used to describe low income housing typically subsidized, section 8 . Another white lie is that this is for people who are just starting out like new teachers. The starting wage of a teacher in Milford (fulltime) is 38,400. The maximum amount of income for most in section 8 housing is about 20,000(area median income). So guess what teachers aren’t moving into these units, the Milford fire department is volunteer, and the Milford Police Department isn’t filling out voucher forms. There is an up to a nine year wait for these units so there are grants and subsidies for builders to make these units. Plus the income is guaranteed by the state and/or the Federal government and most likely the owners don’t live in the town so they don’t care.
Also first in line for these units are folks who are refuges or people seeking asylum. While we are built on our strength through diversity, state and federal authorities don’t seem to consider the extra cost when resettling. Look at Manchester, they’ve gotten so many refugees in the city the Mayor Gatsas has called for a moratorium. Their school system has to have ESL tutors for at least 10 other languages. Milford’s social services budget is what 20k? How much will Milford have to raise its school taxes to handle an influx of kids with learning issues? Plus how many additional costs will pop-up for more emergency calls or greater need for town assistance? SHARE can’t even keep up with the amount of help that is requested. Expect a significant raise in property taxes every year for a long time. Milford’s population is about 14,200 people. Let’s add 1000 people who need town, state and federal assistance and see what happens. Larger cities have in the state have populations from 80-90k. They can spread the cost over a larger group and have a greater pool of revenue to pull from.
The town master plan call for have a mix of housing available and the town does have this already available. The people of have made it very clear they want the rural character of the town maintained. They didn’t call for cheap low income housing popping up all over town in areas that were zoned commercial previously because they could be hidden away from plain view and still keep the oval looking nice. Poor decisions with the creation and adoption of ordinances by the town’s community development department along with the Planning board will turn Milford in a ghetto in a few years. Unfortunately this has been spurred on by a federal grant to make Milford a case study in central planning and development. This grant is also forcing department to rush ordinances through to make a deadline for a federal grant. Sadly most folks don’t notice or care until it’s too late. Everybody is busy with family and friends but people need to realize that these decisions will have negative consequences for the town down the road. Folks really need to vote no on any more changes to the town ordinances and there needs to be honest explanations of the existing ones with both the positive and negative consequences of adopting them. Transparency in these decisions by a small group of people is really lacking. People have choices and they can make them when they vote.
Andrew Seale
Milford Conservation Commissioner
Former Nashua Regional Planning Executive Commissioner - Treasurer