Complaint Filed Against Chatham ZBA Chair

CHATHAM – The chair of the town’s community housing partnership has filed a formal complaint asking the select board to review zoning board of appeals chair David Nixon’s conduct during the board’s Aug. 20 hearing on the Pennrose Meetinghouse Road comprehensive permit hearing. 

Karolyn McClelland, a longtime affordable housing advocate, charged that Nixon demonstrated pre-judgment and personal animus toward Pennrose, referring to the company as “a terrible choice” and saying that the developer has “no soul” and “no heart.” 

Her Sept. 13 complaint letter alleged that Nixon relied on “dramatic, highly emotional narratives” rather than an objective review of the 42-unit affordable housing proposal. He invoked “hypothetical child safety scenarios” and read news accounts of unrelated accidents while rejecting peer-reviewed traffic data. This “creates severe legal vulnerability for the town before the [state] housing appeals committee, risking automatic administrative reversal and incurring unnecessary legal expenses for the town,” McClelland wrote.

Nixon was one of three ZBA members who voted against the Pennrose project at the board’s Sept. 9 meeting. His chief concern was the company’s rejection of a sidewalk along the project’s frontage on Meetinghouse Road, which Nixon asserted jeopardized the safety of tenants who would have to walk along the road to reach a bus stop on Route 28. 

McClelland also alleged that Nixon framed support for the project as causing the death of children and asserted that his fellow board members could be responsible for such a tragedy. That “crosses the line from legitimate policy debate into emotional coercion and improper intimidation of colleagues,” the letter reads.

She also charged that Nixon misstated income eligibility for the project and exaggerated the developer’s profit margin, “disregarding the statutory 10 percent profit limitation established” under Massachusetts law. He also strayed outside the ZBA’s statutory jurisdiction by asserting that the town should abandon housing for families and eliminate the school budget in favor of school choice, McCelland alleges.

Officials acting in a quasi-judicial capacity, such as the zoning board, are bound by state administrative law and ethics standards to provide “an impartial, objective, and evidence-based hearing,” she wrote. Nixon’s comments at the Aug. 20 meeting “fundamentally compromised the integrity of the board’s proceedings and exposed to the town to unnecessary legal risk,” she wrote.

She asked that the select board review the hearing record and take appropriate administrative measures — such as censure, reorganization of the ZBA’s leadership or removal from office — that will “reaffirm the town’s commitment to fair governance. As the zoning board’s appointing authority, the board needs to “restore integrity and neutrality to Chatham’s land use proceedings,” McClelland wrote.

Town Manager Jill Goldsmith said she would be meeting with select board Chair Jeffrey Dykens to determine how to proceed with the complaint.

 A telephone message left for Nixon and an email forwarded through the community development department seeking comment for this story were not returned by deadline.