TEWKSBURY MASTER PLAN COMMITTEE MEETING
The meeting was called to order at
The meeting minutes of
The committee felt that more time was needed to synthesis and discuss the details of the previously approved Technical Papers #1 through #6. After much discussion and input from the committee and residents in attendance, the following changes to the Master Plan Meeting Calendar were approved by a motion made by Gill and seconded by Wilkie:
Previous Scheduled
Topic/Date: New Topic/New Date:
New Topic Discuss Previous Papers, Feb. 13
Transportation, Dec. 12 Transportation, Mar. 13
Community Facilities… Feb. 13 Community Facilities…, Mar. 27
Policy Implementation, Mar. 13 Policy Implementation, Apr. 14 & 21
Discuss MP Elements, May 22 No topic yet, keep as placeholder
Delivery Draft MP Elements, May 02 Delivery MP Elements, May 22
Discussion Meeting, Jun. 12 Discussion Meeting, Jun. 12
Draft Final Report, Jun. 19 Draft Final Report, July 17
Discussion Meeting, Jun. 26 Discussion Meeting, Aug. 04
Public Hearing, Jul. 17 Public Hearing, Aug. 14
Final Report, Aug. 14 Final Report, Sep. 15
The first public hearing regarding the draft master plan
will occur as the sole agenda item on
Beverly Bennett from the Historical Commission could not attend, but did submit through Reed some additions to the historical buildings/landmarks list which was then
passed on to Judi Barrett. Sadwick also stated that the Town Manager had reviewed the document and had submitted some suggestions/changes for the committee to consider. That brought up questions as to what process the committee would use for additional input. The committee decided that the master plan committee would be the first to review draft and discuss it during the public meetings. The committee will then accept the draft as amended, and approve it to be posted on the website unedited. Additional comments would be welcome for 2 weeks, with the intent to review any additional comments at the next scheduled master plan meeting. At that next scheduled meeting if any further changes are needed, the draft would be revised, reapproved as amended, edited and posted on the website. Or, if no changes are necessary, the draft will be edited per the previous vote and posted.
The “Open Space and Natural Resources” draft was accepted as amended by the committee by a motion from Reed, seconded by Gill and approved unanimously by the committee.
Mary Coolidge summarized the main points of the paper discussing how during the visioning process, the residents were concerned about where businesses would be located in the future, about the vacancy of many buildings in town, and also expressed a desire for a town center.
The committee agreed with the consultant’s key questions in Challenge #1, “Reuse of Existing Commercial and Industrial Property”. With regards to Route 38, it was felt that the town wants and needs to establish expansion limits as well as streetscape design standards, ie, signage, landscaping, parking, etc. It was also felt that it would be possible to confine future commercial sprawl of Rt. 38, and create transitions to protect residential areas.
In Challenge #2,” Town Center Development”, Mary discussed how the Town has an opportunity to begin to work towards a town center, or downtown area. Although it may take 10-15 years or more, there seems to be interest on the townspeople’s part, and momentum due to the larger influx of service type businesses in the area. It was agreed that opportunities do exist that could promote working towards a town center plan. Additionally the Town could and should address the current unsafeness and uncoordinated pedestrian/vehicular traffic situation in and around Town Hall. The committee agreed with the key questions asked, and added Reed’s suggestion to add a historic preservation comment to the list of suggestions by the consultant.
In discussing Challenge #3, “Economic Development Policies and Plans”, the committee agreed with the consultant’s analysis, that due to Tewksbury not having a formal economic policy, that its approach to development has been random, very uncoordinated and more investor driven. The committee agreed that we need to change the focus from
accepting almost every business that wants to come into town, to focusing on attracting the businesses that we want to locate in our town.
The Economic Development draft papers were approved as amended by a motion made by Torname, seconded by Gill, and approved unanimously by the committee.
The committee agreed with the Key Challenges and Questions presented in the Housing papers. In Challenge #1,”Inclusionary Zoning and Local Control”, Judi Barrett stated that our inclusionary by law is a good start but, (as we were already aware of), will not get us very far in adding low to moderate income housing to the Town’s inventory. One option, according to Barrett, which is tends to be more controversial, is to apply inclusionary zoning to all districts. The by laws could be structured so that developers have a choice, or so that it can be negotiated. Some other options the Town could consider would be to tweak the cluster bylaw and/or zone more land for multi family. Sweet stated that the zoning by law committee was already looking at the cluster by law and other ideas and suggested that the zoning by law committee continue to work on a parallel with master plan committee re this challenge.
“Preservation of Existing Housing Stock”, Challenge #2, may be a way for the Town to increase its inventory of permanently affordable stock without building more new homes on undeveloped land. The consultant’s analysis offers many opportunities that the committee agreed would be worthwhile to explore.
Challenge #3, “Higher Density Housing”-opportunities exist for the Town to increase its supply of a mix of homes for affordable housing, such as identifying land for higher density housing, encouraging mixed use development, rezoning , redevelopment/reuse of existing properties. Judi will ask the committee for a “political/ policy read on this issue at the 02/13/03 Master Plan meeting.
In Challenge #4, “Local Housing Initiatives”, the committee agreed with the consultant’s ideas to offer some more development strategies to the committee and the Local Housing Partnership to produce more affordable housing.
It was agreed that Challenge #5, “Managing the Chapter 40B Process”, may be the most important in that the Town may benefit greatly by adopting a Comprehensive Permit Policy, and an Affordable Housing Plan qualified by the State. Such a policy and plan would help guide town officials in interpreting an acceptable Chapter 40B proposal vs. an unacceptable one. It would provide a much needed framework for town-developer negotiations, provide guidance, and ultimately may establish guidelines for denying comprehensive permits.
Gill motioned to adopt Technical Paper #5, “Population & Housing” which was seconded by Duffy and approved unanimously by the committee.
The next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, February 13, 2003, at the Tewksbury Police Station at 7pm. Gill motioned for adjournment at 9:06pm, which was seconded by Duffy.