Heritage Defined

What better place is there to begin this look at Dennis town government in the 21st Century than to go right to the World Wide Web? http://www.town.dennis.ma.us/Pages/index

And that’s where we find this description of how someone at Town Hall presents the Town:

“Dennis, named an All American Town in 1978, combines its traditional New England heritage with modern day conveniences.”
 
Did someone say, “traditional  New  England heritage?” 

I love that phrase, and I couldn’t ask for a better place to start. After all, this payroll someone hasn’t introduced the world to Dennis by invoking some of its traditional Town heritage. Surely, Dennis must be proud of Sleepy John Sears, who invented a better way of producing salt from saltwater, or of Asa Shiverick and his sons, whose sailing ships had plied the waters of the world. 

But is that the foundation upon which the Town wants to build its reputation in this world? 

Apparently not.  

Some payroll someone decided that the Town of Dennis should dress itself in something more than just its local heritage and wrap itself in the mantle of all New England: the Town Meeting form of government.

Stepping away from http://www.town.dennis.ma.us/Pages/index for the moment, you can get a little more insight into the Dennis self-image by seeing how the Commonwealth of Massachusetts looks upon this “traditional New England heritage” called “Town Meeting.”

“In use for over 300 years and still today,” says the Secretary of the Commonwealth, William Francis Galvin, “[Town Meeting] has proven to be a valuable means for many Massachusetts taxpayers to voice their opinions and directly effect change in their communities. Here in this ancient American assembly, you can make your voice heard as you and your neighbors decide the course of the government closest to you.” 

Wow. Though I’m not so sure that 300 years qualifies anything as being “ancient,” there can be no doubt that Town Meeting is our Massachusetts heritage; thus, it is the Town’s New England heritage.

Let me take a moment here to invoke some extreme heaviosity and quote a line or two from Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy In America, which the French historian wrote in two volumes after traveling this nation in the mid-19th Century.

“[L]ocal assemblies of citizens constitute the strength of free nations. Town-meetings are to liberty what primary schools are to science; they bring it within the people’s reach, they teach men how to use and how to enjoy it. A nation may establish a system of free government, but without the spirit of municipal institutions it cannot have the spirit of liberty.”

This, I might further suggest is our “traditional New England heritage.”

He goes on to note in his history that, “The townships have the right to make by-laws, and to enforce them by fines which are fixed by law.”

As Secretary of State Galvin further explains, Town Meeting is the one place where registered voters are entitled to exercise control over three areas: (1) the salaries for the elected officials; (2) the appropriation of money to run the town; and (3) the enactment of the Town’s local statutes, which are called By-laws. And whenever Town Meeting adopts a By-law which regulates the use of land, buildings and/or structures in order to protect the health, safety and general welfare of the Town’s present and future inhabitants, this is a called a Zoning By-Law. 

Make no mistake about it: Town Meeting is our “traditional New England heritage.”

If you take a closer, more local look at things, you’ll see that very concept reiterated in the Zoning By-laws enacted by Dennis Town Meeting and stated this way [with my bold emphasis]:

SECTION 1 - ADMINISTRATION & INTERPRETATION

1.1 TITLE
This By-Law shall be known as the Dennis Zoning By-Law. 

1.2 PURPOSE
The purpose of this By-Law is to promote the health, safety, convenience, amenity, and general welfare of the inhabitants of the Town of Dennis, through encouraging the most appropriate use of the land as authorized by Chapter 808 of the Acts of 1975, with objectives as follows: 

To lessen congestion in the ways; to conserve health; to secure safety from fire, flood, panic and other dangers; to provide adequate light and air; to prevent overcrowding of land; to avoid undue concentration of population; to recognize the need for housing for persons of all income levels; to facilitate the adequate provision of transportation, water, water supply, drainage, schools, parks, open space, and other public requirements; to conserve the value of land and buildings, including the conservation of natural resources and the prevention of blight and pollution of the environment; to encourage the most appropriate use of land throughout the town, including consideration of the master plan, and to preserve and increase amenities by the promulgation of regulations to fulfill said objectives. 

1.3 ADMINISTRATION
  1.3.1 Enforcement     
  The Building Commissioner shall administer and enforce the provisions of this By-Law. No permit shall be issued for construction or for the change of use of any land or premises unless the required submitted plans and specifications indicate that buildings, structures, premises and their use will conform in all respects to the provisions of this By-Law.

For the purposes of this blog, let me now point out two things. 

First, there is absolutely nothing (N-O-T-H-I-N-G) in Section 1.2 Purpose of the Dennis Zoning By-law which even implies, let alone states, that zoning land use is an instrument for developing or promoting the Dennis economy. 

Second, the Dennis Building Commissioner does not accept the notion that the Building Commissioner is authorized only to ENFORCE and is not authorized to INTERPRET the specific words of a By-law as adopted by the voters of Town Meeting.
 
This blog is dedicated to every member of Dennis Town Meeting who believes that a vote cast (either for or against an article) actually means something and to every permit applicant in Dennis who has been required by the Town Planner or the Building Commissioner to seek some sort of remedy before the Zoning Board of Appeals.