Planning Board members asked to resign

By Jonathan Cook
Turley Publications Reporter

WARREN – A letter was sent by the Board of Selectmen Tuesday night after their regular meeting. It was addressed to Planning Board members William Ramsey and March Richard, asking them to resign their posts in five days or face a special election recall vote.
The letter is part of a process dictated by state law that was launched by Jim Fountain to remove the two members from office. The first step was to collect signatures of registered voters who also support a recall. Fountain needed 615 signatures per ballot. Town Clerk Nancy Lowell verified 698 signatures on the Richard petition, and 685 for Ramsey.
Now that the Board of Selectmen has sent the letter requesting their speedy resignation, the decision by each member to resign or to submit to a special election awaits.
If they resign, the remaining Planning Board members will meet with the Selectmen to appoint replacements, according to Selectman David Delanski. If they do not resign, he said, an election date will be selected at the next regular board meeting.
Delanski added that Ramsey and Richard may run in the election, but must be re-sworn-in if they win.
Fountain, who was a Planning Board member himself for 16 years, has a pending lawsuit against the Planning Board in Worcester Superior Court. Fountain’s complaint says he was improperly denied a special permit regarding a house he rebuilt on Quaboag Street. Fountain wanted to allow an office on one side, but he was issued a permit limiting the office personnel to include two specific people. Fountain said that was not fair because if one person moved out, the whole office would have to move out. Meanwhile, the prospective tenants for the space can no longer wait, said Fountain. He is not the only resident willing to go on record with a complaint.
Vern Keith recently contacted this paper to tell his story. Keith is a disabled Korean War Vet who is mostly confined to a motorized wheelchair. He received a grant from the Veteran’s Administration to add a handicap accessible bathroom to his bedroom in amount of about $60,000. When plans were put together, costs were estimated at about $20,000. The VA told him he could use the rest to pay down his mortgage. But, even though the neighbors supported his design, he said, the Planning Board denied it because it would have been too close to the property line. The new plan cost almost every penny of the grant, leaving Keith without the mortgage payment he’d been expecting. And even then, Keith described a permit process of unnecessary delays.
Now another sort of special permit process has begun – two Planning Board members must receive special permission from voters to remain in office.
With that on the table, the Planning Board is scheduled to join the Selectmen at an information session May 19 to discuss the Warrant Articles with the general public.
What else Richard and Ramsey have in mind is unknown. In an effort to contact them, messages were left at their homes and at the Planning Board office two days before deadline. They did not respond.