He characterized the Essex town staff report on Bove's project as “very negative.”Īt one point, O’Leary implied that Bove may raise rents at the Whittier Building if the town didn’t approve his proposed development. Housing Commission chair Katie Ballard urged the planning commissioners to consider renters’ quality of life in their decision making.īove representative Paul O’Leary told commissioners that he felt his client had been “shanghai’ed” because he was not invited to attend other board meetings where the project was discussed. Representatives from the Essex Housing Commission, a recently formed advisory board for the town and village, and the Essex Economic Development Commission also testified in opposition to Bove’s project. Whittier Building resident Traci Rochester.“I think that Rick needs to take care of what he already has before he builds anything else,” she said. She trembled as she addressed the commission, explaining that she feared her landlord, who was seated behind her, would retaliate against her for speaking out. “I just feel we’re being treated as a rent check, rather than humans,” Traci said. Traci Rochester and her daughter, Taylor, detailed broken doors, malfunctioning heating systems, “unusable” laundry facilities and leaky ceilings that destroyed their belongings. Rick Bove attended the hearing but did not speak.ĭuring public comment, however, a longtime resident of the Whittier Building described a litany of problems at the property since the Bove family bought it. They did not address their client’s code compliance issues at the adjacent property. At a follow-up hearing on Thursday, Bove’s engineers with O’Leary-Burke Civil Associates presented a revised plan that included an agreement to add commercial space to one of the buildings and construct the first phase of an envisioned town green. The planning commission held its first hearing in June but did not vote on the proposal’s merits. Essex Planning Commission chair Dustin Bruso, center.Earlier this year, Bove submitted plans to construct three new buildings of mostly market-rate, one-bedroom apartments and some commercial space. One of the complexes, the Whittier Building, had been constructed by a different developer using public subsidies, with 26 of its 44 units subject to affordability requirements. The Bove brothers already own a mixed-use portion of the Essex Town Center near the intersection of Upper Main Street and Route 289. The news outlets found that maintenance needs have been neglected across the 400-plus rentals that Rick and his brother, Mark, own in several communities, leaving low-income tenants to live in substandard conditions. The Essex Planning Commission on Thursday rejected a proposal by Rick Bove to build 60 more rental units at the Essex Town Center, citing health and safety violations at his existing buildings there.Ĭommissioners denied Bove’s proposal unanimously, following the recommendation of Essex town officials who have been tussling with Bove over overflowing dumpsters at the property for the last four years. One commissioner, Ned Daly, recused himself because he has a relationship with Bove.īove’s mismanagement of his Vermont rental empire, including at the Essex Town Center, was the subject of a joint investigation published earlier this month by Seven Days and Vermont Public Radio.
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