Beth Moreau was added to the City’s powerful Planning Board in 2013. Ever since then, she has been joined at the hip with the entrenched city bureaucracy and reinforced its close alignment with the special interests in Portsmouth. Here’s just one example:
In 2019, the Planning Board granted final approval for the West End Yards project. The developer received a “density bonus” that permitted more apartments per acre than the current zoning allowed. In return, 20% of the housing needed to qualify as “workforce.”
The developer admitted that 20% wouldn’t work for him and hinted that 10% would be a “better number.” Vice Chair Moreau put on a good performance about wanting the “workforce” designation to stick to these units for 60 years instead of 30 but in the end, caved to the developer’s wishes.
Just the type of person you want representing YOUR interests, right?
After an unsuccessful 2017 bid, Beth Moreau was swept on to the City Council as part of the 2021 Progress Portsmouth slate. According to its founder, “We have no interest in helping create a Council voting bloc.”
Are you kidding?
As everyone except the Portsmouth Herald knows, the eight Progress Portsmouth slate candidates plus one, became collectively known as the Boondoggle Nine because: 1) of their inability to get anything done, and 2) they voted together on virtually every issue.
Moreau is known by many (and not affectionately) as “Giggles,” because of her annoying habit of laughing at everything. She also is known for trumpeting her numerous “skills.” Not a modest lass, she.
Giggle, giggle, chortle, chortle, cackle, cackle, chuckle, chuckle, snicker, snicker, ha, ha, ha!
According to her 2021 Candidate Questionnaire, Giggles bragged that: “I have skills in negotiation that allow me to work towards building a consensus on the solutions for issues…It takes vision and leadership to actually do something about them.”
Now the reality.
The biggest and most important opportunity for “vision and leadership” was the future of the Thomas J. McIntyre building. And the best time to put those good negotiating skills to work was with the GSA about securing the McIntyre property for $1. What happened? Moreau and the other councilors offloaded this responsibility to the City Manager and then put their heads in the sand.
What a disaster that turned out to be!
Ha ha ha – that’s hilarious.
By the way, did you know that Moreau was an accomplished equestrian – for the unenlightened, she rode horses!
Now if you observe Moreau even for a few moments, you notice how she interacts with others. She is the expert, the authority on everything — and she’s bossy.
What she really wants is to be King of the Hill, the Top Dog, the Jedi Master!
Jedi Master?
Yes! Two years ago, she told the world that for Halloween, she wanted to be a Jedi Master – Trick or Treat!
Close your eyes and think about this for a moment or take a look at the cool picture of Yoda Moreau.
Tee hee, tee hee!
And, she has her pupil, her Luke Skywalker — it’s Hizzoner the Mayor.
Just watch a few City Council meetings and you will notice the strange activity at the end of the dais where Yoda Moreau sits.
Hizzoner inevitably gets mixed up on the Roberts Rules of Order: Is there a second to this motion? Whoops, we need a motion to suspend the rules, me thinks.
Meanwhile Yoda Moreau is either vigorously nodding or shaking her head and mumbling in her best Jedi Master Voice: “You must unlearn what you have learned. Try not. Do. Or do not. There is no try.”
Snicker, snicker.
Hizzoner: “Do we need a roll-call vote? Or is it a bathroom break?”
Yoda Moreau shaking her head: “Secret, shall I tell you? Grand Master of Jedi Order am I. Won this job in a raffle I did, think you? Master Yoda knows these things. His job it is.”
After almost two years, you would think Hizzoner would have picked up all of the ins and outs of running a City Council meeting. On the other hand, the City Attorney has been known to phone a friend in a tough spot.
Chortle, chortle!
But being the Jedi Master for Hizzoner is not her end game. It is a mere steppingstone to bigger and better things.
After all, as a real estate attorney in town, Yoda Moreau had assembled a pretty nice rolodex of developer buddies. These guys had been salivating over ways to pave over the City for years, if only she could help grease the skids (or heat up the macadam).
Plus, the Planning Board was getting boring, especially since she had been unable to dislodge the guy at the top and had to sit there steaming as Vice Chair while he screwed things up!
Yoda Morea under her breath: “We are what they grow beyond. That is the true burden of all masters.”
Patience Young Grasshopper (oops, wrong movie! But isn’t that a Cobra Kai in the corner?)
Besides, things on the city’s land use committees were looking better all the time for Yoda Moreau. Last December, Hizzoner appointed her husband to be on the Board of Adjustment. This Board rules on requests for Variances and Special Exceptions from the Zoning Ordinance as well as Appeals from Administrative Decisions.
Some took exception to this controversial appointment – just think of the potential conflicts of interest.
Too bad, he was approved anyway (9-0?). Could be some interesting pillow talk, no?
Yoda Moreau’s response: “You will find only what you bring in. Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny.”
Cackle Cackle Cackle
It was time to take matters into her own hands – time to start a brand-new committee that would give her unlimited powers!
And before you could say “density bonus,” the City Council approved the Land Use Committee. And because it was an ad hoc group, no ordinance was required — just a little nudge to the other councilors who were distracted by the City Manager’s loopy ideas.
Chuckle chuckle
This was perfect, just what a Jedi Master needed! Yoda Moreau had her own committee with rules and regulations she could make up as she went along plus a scribe paid to take notes. Now all developers, residents, and businesses would be her docile pupils – they would kiss her ring.
Ha ha ha
Here’s the perfect little fiefdom she created:
The purpose of the Land Use Committee is to review ALL current zoning and policies surrounding housing and development to encourage SUSTAINABLE, DIVERSE, AND AFFORDABLE DEVELOPMENT INCLUDING EXPANDED MULTI-MODAL TRANSPORTATION!
What is Multi Modal Transportation? Bikes first, cars last, people somewhere in between. Think Middle Street all over Portsmouth.
Snort, Snort, chortle
And do you know who is on the Land Use Committee? Of course, Yoda Moreau is Chair plus the most knowledgeable City Council members on zoning laws, Joanna “Wannabe Mayor” Kelley and “Bart” Rich Blaylock.
She threw in two members of the Planning Board (for laughs), two members from the Planning Department staff (one big revolving door) and the head of the Portsmouth Housing Authority (why not?)
By the way, the PHA Executive Director said that he would like to build work-force housing “on all of the potential city sites!” That’s the spirit – good team player!
Snicker, Snicker, Snicker
And speaking of some of the city’s most valuable assets – its land – don’t think for one minute that this belongs to all the taxpayers. No! It is going to end up providing a tidy sum for the PHA, maybe a few other developers and some cheap apartments for a small group of lucky folks, and they don’t even have to be from Portsmouth.
So how did the Committee decide to select the Sherburne School building for their next project? By using a sophisticated process – eenie, meenie, miney, mo. Too bad Sherburne School neighborhood – and that means Pannaway Manor – you were mo!
Yoda Moreau has plans to expand city-wide!
Titter, Titter!
Where do you think Andrew “Burgundy” Bagley came up with the idea of turning Portsmouth into a monopoly board of Quonset huts – it was, the Land Use Committee!
And don’t talk about this NIMBY stuff – your backyard belongs to the city of Portsmouth. That means Nurse Ratched and her crew.!
Step number one: increase diversity of housing types and price points. In plain English, the city will bless a really nice big house here and a little tiny one in the back yard. And next to that a 60-unit affordable housing project.
No more quiet, leafy neighborhoods with beautiful green lawns. Yoda Moreau will see to it that there are plenty of multifamily, affordable units next to your house too.
That will take care of the affordable housing problem. In a few years, your home will be worth half of what it is today.
The good news is that Yoda Moreau is running again, “Because there is a lot of work to be done.”
Now that’s really funny!
Source, Yoda quotes, The Empire Strikes Back: Best Life
