BEAT’s Blog

In my last post, I told the story of how the City of Pittsfield decided that instead of having Jim Bouton and Chip Elitzer fund the reconstruction of a renovated Wahconah Park, the City should do it themselves with taxpayer money. My impression is that this allows the money involved in the project to go to the “right” people. The City waited for Jim and Chip to spend lots of money on plans and designs, waited for them to get the necessary permits, and then usurped the project without so much as removing the name of Jim’s and Chip’s business from the plans. When Chip sent the City a cease-and-desist notice forbidding them from using the plans that had been funded privately, Pittsfield said it wasn’t using the plans or permits. But the City had just filed for an amendment to the permit (Jim’s and Chip’s permit) which uses Jim’s and Chip’s plans and designs as its basis.

One of BEAT’s environmental complaints regarding this project began when we noticed piles of fill in Wahconah Park’s parking lot, right near the stadium’s chain link fence. Anyone who knows the area knows that this parking lot floods every year, because the parking lot is actually part of the Housatonic River from time to time. In fact, the piles of fill were soon under water. This is a violation of wetlands laws. The City was required to obtain a wetlands permit to put those piles there, because at least some of the fill could easily end up in the Housatonic River. Did the City get a permit that allowed them to put piles of fill in the river? Well, it depends on when you ask them and which answer they think the situation calls for. Read more…