NAHANT — Selectmen cancelled a Special Town Meeting they called last month to rescind a Wetlands Protection Bylaw voted in a previous Special Town Meeting.
“My decision to want to revisit the wetlands bylaw is not based on the original vote or the people showing up to meetings and doing what they do,” said chairman Chesley Taylor. “(It’s) based on the concerns I have heard about the process by which it was voted on.”
Nahant has an open Town Meeting, meaning any registered voter who lives in town can vote. More than 500 residents did so at a Special Town Meeting in August.
In a meeting that lasted more than 3½ hours and left not a single chair — or square inch of floor space — unoccupied, a yes or no ballot was handed out, as voted by the body, and 285 returned the slip in favor while 278 were opposed to an amendment to the town’s bylaws to change the permitting process for projects within the town’s wetlands.
The bylaw, which was approved by Attorney General Maura Healey on Sept. 13, in essence prohibits the removal, filling, dredging, building upon, degrading, discharging into, or otherwise altering the listed resource areas (freshwater or coastal wetlands, marshes, etc.) except as authorized by the Conservation Commission. The bylaw establishes a permit application, notice and hearing, and determination procedure.
Registered voters passed the bylaw by seven votes.
In September, selectmen voted 2-1 to have a Special Town Meeting to rescind the bylaw, citing the heat, overcrowding, and problems with the process.
The meeting was set for Saturday, Dec. 1 at noon with the option to use the Johnson Elementary School for overflow space.
Residents at the meeting were not on board with the decision.
Julie Tarmy said she wasn’t happy with the result of the vote, but she didn’t think it should be retaken.
“We voted,” she said. “It’s done. Now if it comes up in the future and gets reversed, so be it. But to call a Special Town Meeting to vote again, I don’t think is the route we want to take.”
At a meeting Thursday night, selectmen voted unanimously to cancel the meeting and instead discuss rescinding the bylaw at the Annual Town Meeting.
Chesley said rules and regulations still need to be determined by the Conservation Commission and approved by the Board of Selectmen. By the time it is ready for viewing, it will leave limited time for voters to view before the next vote.
“That is not fair and that is one of the reasons people came to me about the first meeting,” he said.
More importantly, the three selectmen said, the town has been divided on the issue and the “hatred and animosity” needs to end.
“I’ve heard enough and seen enough,” said Richard Lombard, the longest serving selectmen in town. “It is time to stop. I’ve never witnessed anything like it in all my 35 years on the Board of Selectmen.”
