Council Approves Purchase of Land for Water Treatment Plant

After listening to nearly two hours of questions and concerns from residents regarding a $390,000 purchase of land on Jillson Avenue for the purpose of building a new water treatment plant, the Woonsocket City Council approved the deal last night by a vote of 6 to 1, dismissing requests to hold another public hearing on the matter.

Fourteen people spoke against immediate approval the contract, through which the city will buy an 18.9 acre plot of land from City Council candidate Roland Michaud and his wife Suzanne. While many concerns were centered around lack of information regarding the site, some residents also pushed for postponement of the plan which they said Woonsocket cannot afford.

"Call this what you want, it's a tax increase, and people can't afford anymore," said Bruce Burlingame, a Century 21 real estate agent, who discussed the number of recent foreclosures in the city. 

"When you ask the taypayers to foot the bill at such an exorbitant cost, you have to give adequate public notice," said Lorraine Corey, a resident who runs the informational website mywoonsocket.com.

The land purchase decision comes after more than three years of debate and analysis. The city signed a consent agreement to build the facility with the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (RIDEM) in June of 2008 is under deadline to complete the project by March of 2013.

In 2010, the project was headed by then Public Works Director Mike Annarummo and the preferred option for the facility was a the city to Pawtucket, creating a regional approach to water issues. Vocal opposition to that project resulted in creation of a Water Advisory Board in January of 2011.

The board, appointed by Mayor Leo Fontaine, was made up of two city council liaisons, Christopher Beauchamp and Daniel Gendron, and five residents: Owen Bebeau, Allen Rivers, James Cournoyer, Matthew Tessitore, and Paul Levreault. The group held sessions between January and June, requesting input from RIDEM, engineers from Camp Dresser and McKie, Planning and Development Director Joel Mathews and Annarummo's replacement, Public Works Director Sheila McGauvran.

Although Mathews in March that they were unlikely to meet their deadline with RIDEM, McGauvran said if the city towards completion of the project, they might be able to avoid penalties. Two thirty day extensions of their work resulted in a unanimous recommendation of the Michauds' property, a parcel made up of five lots situated between Jillson Avenue and Bernon Heights Elementary School.   

Many public misconceptions about the transaction became clear throughout the hearing, a problem which Water Advisory Board Chair James Cournoyer believes may have been avoided by posting his board's full recommendation along with the City Council agenda for the meeting. Cournoyer's association with Michaud through the Woonsocket Taxpayer Coalition, along with the pair's bids for seats on the City Council in the November election resulted in several accusations of impropriety.

"Long before I got involved in this, they were looking at the site on Jillson Avenue: it was in The Woonsocket Call in January of 2006," Cournoyer said. "No one's getting a deal. There are no games being played. If anything, if [Michaud]'s interested in being on the City Council, this doesn't help him. You have to be nuts to walk into a firestorm like this."

City Council candidate who also works as a realtor in the city, questioned the price tag on the lot, which he said had been assessed at a total of $113,000 in 2008. A pre-purchase appraisal of the property showed a fair market value of $460,000.

"I know if I put that property on the market at $460,000, it would probably sit there for about 10 years," Mancieri said. 

Council president John Ward pointed out that the city is purchasing the land for less than the cost required to take the property by eminent domain.

School Committee candidate expressed concern regarding the site's proximity to the Bernon Heights Elementary School nature trail.

"It provides plenty of buffer," Cournoyer said of the site. "There's going to be minimal impact to the nature trail."

A motion by Council member Roger Jalette to table the matter until the second meeting of the newly elected city council did not receive support from other council members.

"I think Mr Michaud's property is the best property for this project," said Jalette. "but we should have a second public hearing because there was a ton of information we received that the public should have a chance to go through."

Jalette was the lone council member to vote against the transaction.

"The fact is, we appoint people to these committees because we trust them to do the job," said Ward. "I think they worked hard and collected huge amounts of data and analyzed it well."

City Council candidate Albert Brien also disputed the notion that there was any impropriety in the recommendation or purchase.

"As I sat here as a taxpayer and I listened to the conversation about the water treatment plant, it was a very interesting conversation only because it was enhanced in interest by the fact that it's the political season and several people who were involved are political candidates," Brien said. "There's a perception that there's an undercurrent of subterfuge and there was something that went beyond the basics of what has transpired in the last year."

"I regret the unfortunate air that has been cast over this process," he continued. "I would hope at the very least you would recognize that the people involved with this were sincere, they were concerned, they were meditative... they were good Woonsocket citizens and they did the very very best that they thought they could do for their community."

Many of the other factors which went into the board's recommendation were discussed during Monday night's meeting. The full recommendation of the Water Advisory Board, which answers many question regarding their eventual choice, is attached above.