[MassHistPres] Demo by neglect bylaw violation by the town

[Richard McGrath]

Greetings! The town of Lunenburg has a vacant 1929 brick high school that
has been vacant for 10 years, or so, and has been undergoing demolition by
neglect because the town has refused to properly mothball the building.
Demolition by Neglect is a violation of the town bylaw. The Selectboard
says that they can't properly mothball the building because the public has
not authorized them to spend the money to do so.

My questions are, can a town be in violation of its own law? Is there some
way that they can be held accountable? Is there anything that the state can
do? If a town can just disregard its own bylaws and continue on as it
pleases, or as it is dictated to by the public, what is the purpose of
having the law? A citizen cannot disregard the law. How is it that a
selectboard can?

Has anyone had an experience with a situation like this.

Regards,

Richard McGrath, Chair
Lunenburg APDC
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.cs.umb.edu/pipermail/masshistpres/attachments/20210825/9b7d6a80/attachment.html>