Lakes Region Community Developers appealing Ashland planning board decision rejecting affordable housing in court

ASHLAND — Staff of Lakes Region Community Developers are appealing a planning board decision rejecting a proposal to build housing to Superior Court.

The lawsuit, filed on Oct. 17, names both the Town of Ashland and its planning board, and arose following the planning board's denial of a site plan application submitted by LRCD related to a proposal to subdivide a parcel and develop 76 units of workforce housing.

The complaint, initially filed in Grafton County Superior Court, has since been transferred to the Hillsborough County Superior Court, Northern District Land Use Review Docket. A hearing on the merits is scheduled for Feb. 18.

The project — The Village at Mill Pond — is proposed at 35 Mill Pond Lane in the small Lakes Region town, and is designed to offer affordable housing and four single-family lots, which would be developed in partnership with Pemi-Valley Habitat for Humanity.

The planning board denied the request for the subdivision and the site plan application on Sept. 18.

In the complaint, LRCD filed claims for damages, based on potential violations of their right to due process under state and federal law, based on the town’s violation of the Federal Fair Housing Act.

“There are news stories almost every week about how average people can no longer afford to live in New Hampshire,” LRCD Executive Director Carmen Lorentz wrote in a media release. “We need 3,000 more units of affordable housing in the Lakes Region by 2040 to achieve a more balanced housing market. The Mill Pond project is part of the solution, and we remain focused on our mission to create affordable housing opportunities for people who live and work in the Lakes Region.”

The complaint, which is 86 pages long, details improper conduct by the town's planning board over a year-long review of LRCD’s applications.

From the beginning of the design review process, the proposed housing development was “met with hostility from both members of the Board and members of the public,” according to court documents.

LRCD characterized the review process as “astonishingly mishandled” and “riddled with thinly veiled efforts to prevent the project from coming to fruition.”

Ashland Town Manager Ronald Beard said town leaders are aware of the complaint, and disagrees with the allegations. They’ll address the complaint through the proper channels in the court system, and it's still early in the process, he said.

LRCD’s core allegations are: the town made cumbersome an ever-shifting process to obtain commentary from town employees; failed to notice in a timely manner the applications and refused to schedule a special meeting in order comply with a statutory timeframe required to render a complete determination; inaccurately accused LRCD of failing to provide information and of hiding information; and repeatedly discussed applications at meetings during which no public hearing was noticed.

Additionally, the complaint alleges a member of the town’s selectboard was allowed to make presentations advocating against the project, including when representatives of LRCD were not present, that the board withheld documentation about the project from LRCD, and asserted that the parcel in question is not zoned commercially, which allows for multi-family use by right, when it in fact is zoned commercially.

The complaint also cites numerous instances — both on social media and in person at various meetings — of members of the public voicing discriminatory viewpoints regarding the potential tenants who would likely live in the development. There was also, apparently, a petition circulated online consolidating support among community members for rejecting the project.

In the complaint, LRCD argues the town violated the Federal Fair Housing Act because it: denied or otherwise made unavailable housing to LRCD’s likely tenants due to their family status; and therefore discriminated against LRCD’s likely tenants in the terms, conditions or privileges of a rental of a dwelling based on their family status; and made public statements disfavoring LRCD’s likely tenants based on their familial status or handicap, specifically substance use disorder.

The complaints asks the court to reverse the board’s denial of the subdivision application and site plan application, order the board to pay LRCD’s legal costs and attorney fees, and to award LRCD damages.

“More specifically, the Board’s actions to prevent the Project from moving forward, as described in more detail above, were based on discriminatory motives related to the familial status of the likely tenants of the proposed community, specifically the likelihood that the tenant population of the Project will include families with children,” the complaint reads.