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PLANNING BOARD MINUTES
MEETING OF JANUARY 21, 2009
A regular meeting of the Lexington Planning Board in the Selectmen’s Meeting Room, Town Office
Building was called to order at 7:35 p.m. by Chairman Hornig with board members Zurlo, Manz,
Galaitsis, and Canale present as well as planning staff members McCall-Taylor and Henry.
••••••••••••••••••••••••• SUBDIVISION ADMINISTRATION •••••••••••••••••••••••••
341 Marrett Road, Balanced Housing Development Definitive Site Development Plan: in a letter to the
Board, dated, January 16, 2009, the applicant, North Shore Construction and Development, Inc.,
requested a continuance and, if necessary, an extension of the statutory time limits. The Board opened the
hearing, but took no testimony, immediately voting unanimously to continue the public hearing to
8:30 PM, February 11, 2009, in Cary Auditorium, Cary Hall, 1605 Massachusetts Avenue. This action
does not require any extensions of the statutory time limits governing special permits.
••••••••••••••••••••••••• HARTWELL AVENUE AREA STUDY •••••••••••••••••••••••••
Discussion of Proposed Site Plan Review Bylaw: The Board discussed the proposed SPR bylaw and
began by commenting on its stated purpose. Two members felt that it was verbose and should be more
direct. The other Board members were agreeable to this point and the Board directed the staff to truncate
the paragraph to a more basic statement. It was also decided that the language referencing residential and
agricultural uses was not necessary given the absence of those land uses in the CM district.
The Board then discussed how the SPR bylaw would work interact with the rest of the bylaw and its
many permitting schemes, especially how it would interface with Special Permit requests. The
conversation led to the conclusion that there should only be one permitting authority in these instances.
When applications require only SPR, it was decided that there should be a tiered review system, with
some projects requiring a staff-level, administrative review with all others going before the Board for a
public meeting. The exact triggers for what constitutes site plan review (and the tiers) have yet to be
formulated but it was agreed that less should be put into the bylaw, allowing the Board more flexibility to
distinguish administrative review from full review when authoring regulations pursuant to the SPR bylaw.
The Board’s conversation turned to the proposed length of review and procedural elements (e.g., time
limits) contained in the proposed SPR bylaw. After good discussion, the Board found the time limits
contained in the draft acceptable (60 days) but thought that the rules regarding notice/process needed
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Minutes for the Meeting of January 21, 2009
more Board input. For SPR-only applications (i.e., by right uses subject to review) it was thought that the
requirements found in M.G.L. c. 40A, sec. 11, Notice for Public Hearing, were not appropriate and that
one legal advertisement followed by a public meeting would suffice.
The Board spent the remainder of the meeting revisiting the previous elements of the bylaw in order to
insure themselves of its intent and its potential practice and consequences. In general, the Board agreed
that more thought must be put into what triggers SPR, the thresholds between administrative and full
review and directed the staff to revise the draft proposal accordingly for its next meeting.
Discussion of Proposed Transportation Management Bylaw: The Board briefly discussed the proposed
Transportation Management Overlay bylaw and was generally satisfied with the changes made by the
staff since the last meeting. Comments made were:
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The Applicability statement should be expanded;
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The required planning study should include an implementation element;
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Minor editorial and grammatical preferences and comments; and
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That some specific proposed language be investigated further to better determine its necessity
and/or purpose.
••••••••••••••••••••••••• ADJOURNMENT •••••••••••••••••••••••••
On a motion duly made and seconded, it was voted to adjourn the meeting at 11:05 p.m.
Wendy Manz, Clerk