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STODDARD — Zoning business is temporarily on hold in this town of a little more than 2,000 residents.
Applications for variances and exceptions to the zoning code, for now at least, can only stack up.
The problem? Three of the five members of Stoddard’s zoning board have resigned, along with all three alternates, according to Patricia Putnam, who resigned as both an alternate board member and the board secretary and still serves as the selectmen’s administrative assistant.
Without a quorum of board members, no application can be approved.
The zoning board has been busy lately, particularly while considering a controversial application from AT&T for permission to build a cellphone tower on Melville Hill.
The board was under considerable pressure from residents of Stoddard and neighboring Nelson to reject the application, and held hearings and deliberations on the matter for several months.
The board voted on May 25 to allow a 130-foot monopole tower, but on Thursday of last week board members decided to reconsider the application.
Resignation letters followed, delivered to town hall the next day.
Fred and Ruth Ward, the two board members who voted against the AT&T tower, are the only people associated with the board who have not resigned.
Beverly Power, the board’s chairwoman, resigned, as did Richard Betz, Maureen Meyer and alternates Nancy Robinson and Richard Briere.
“It’s just too much work,” Putnam said, explaining her own decision to resign as both an alternate board member and board secretary. “There’s been a tremendous growth in the zoning board applications, and we figure it’s two or more years with AT&T alone, by the time whoever doesn’t get what they want gets done suing.”
Under state statute, any town with a zoning ordinance — a set of mapped zones and rules that dictate how land can be used in those zones — must also have a zoning board that grants exceptions and variances to the rules.
Members of Stoddard’s zoning board are appointed by the board of selectmen, which will now have to find replacements for the members who have resigned.
It’s important to get the board operating again as soon as possible to deal with the AT&T tower and other pending applications, according to selectmen Chairman Arnold R. Stymest.
But finding people to appoint might be tricky, he said. “It’s going to be a tough job. ... We want someone who will be indifferent and has not stated what side they’re on, and we think it might be hard to find someone in town that fits those requirements.”
Sarah Trefethen can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1439, or strefethen@keenesentinel.com.
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