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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2000-05-16-MGWG-min.pdf Monday, May 22, 2000 Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/ Page: 1 16 meeting Subject: Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/16 meeting Date: Fri, 19 May 2000 10:03:48 -0500 Lexington 20/20 Managing Growth Working Group Meeting Minutes Date: Tuesday, May 16, 2000 at 7 pm Location: Room 111, Town Offices Attendees: Karl Kastorf, Tom Harden, John Frey, Ione Caring, Mike Hanauer, Larry Belvin, Lee Sinai, Suzanne Caton, Fred Merrill, Marianne Lazarus, John Andrews, Karen Longeteig, Donna Rossi, Marilyn Nordby Meeting was called to order at 7 pm by chairperson Tom Harden. Tom Harden proposed the following agenda, which was accepted: 1. Volunteer scribe 2 . Review of proposed agenda and ground rules for discussion 3. Approval of previous minutes 4. Review of schedule and deadlines 5. Report on public outreach questionnaire 6. Discussion of draft narrative 7. Discussion of draft vision statement 8. Discussion of draft goals matrix 9. Next steps Agenda Item 1. Scribe: Suzanne Caton Agenda Item 2. Proposed agenda accepted. Time limits for discussion of individual agenda items proposed and accepted. Group agreed to adhere to original ground rules for discussion, which require person to be recognized by chair before speaking. Agenda Item 3 . Minutes of 5/4/00 were approved. Agenda Item 4. 5/17 Draft report due 5/23 Meeting with CPG (Core Participants Group) Location: Harrington School Cafeteria mailbox:/Macintosh%2OHD/System%20Folder/ Preferences/Netscape%20Users/ •Monday,May 22, 2000 Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/ Page:2 16 meeting Time: 7 - 9:30 pm 5/30 Feedback from CPG due Next meeting of this workgroup 6/6 Last meeting of this workgroup 6/12 Final report due 6/22 Thank you party for all workgroup participants Location: Museum of Our National Heritage Agenda Item 5. Larry Belvin reported on results of questionnaire. *** Number of responses not statistically significant although 10% of Town Meeting Members responded *** No clear consensus from TMMs on priority of 8 issues listed in questionnaire, although majority of non-TMM respondents put Hanscom as #1 issue *** % of increase in taxes to pay for open space acceptable to respondents was about 1%, which was not enough money to do much with *** One interesting comment from one of the respondents: real estate taxes should be based more on house value than land value. There was some discussion in the group about the comment on real estate taxes. Consensus was that it was an intriguing idea. Karl Kastorf led the group in thanking Larry for the effort he put into this public outreach effort. Mike Hanauer noted that it was interesting that so many respondents considered Hanscom as the #1 priority issue. Donna Rossi asked whether any of the working groups are directly addressing the Hanscom issue. Response from group members was that no working group seems to be addressing Hanscom as a separate, stand-alone issue. Karl noted that our group agreed to include Hanscom as part of our general issues, but not as a separate issue. Agenda Item 6. Tom Harden, as primary author of the draft narrative, pointed out that the draft was missing mention of our public outreach efforts and any attempt to address costs and priorities. John Andrews proposed substitute text for the "managed growth" and "anti-growth" paragraphs in the draft narrative, which the group discussed. Most of the group agreed about John's point that "change" rather than "growth" will be what happens in the future -- that large, expansive growth is really not possible any more in Lexington. Several group members suggested that the narrative discuss "managing change. " Several group members expressed unhappiness with the labels "managed growth" and "anti-growth" used in the draft report because they felt that they had mail box:/Macintosh%20HD/System%20Folder/ Preferences/Netscape%20Users/ Monday, May 22, 2000 Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/ Page:3 16 meeting negative connotations. Others in the group felt that they are still legitimate descriptions of the two positions held by members of the group and should be used. Marianne Lazarus suggested that there are no longer two factions in the group -- an anti or no growth faction and a managed growth faction -- but further discussion by the group came to a consensus that there is still disagreement on this point. John Andrews suggested that there is agreement in the group that certain types of growth are harmful or detrimental and that in the future, we need to be careful about the kinds of growth we allow. There was some discussion about how to illustrate the conflict between growth and no growth -- for example, the trade off between building more affordable housing vs. the desire for more open space. Tom Harden noted that he (and the group) agreed with several points made by John Andrews in his proposed substitute text. Tom will try in incorporate them into the next draft of the Narrative. Karl Kastorf moved, and Lee Sinai seconded, that the group accept the draft Narrative as it exists as the draft that will be sent to the CPG on the following day. Karl noted that, if Tom had time to make some changes before the draft was sent to the CPG, that would be fine, too. The motion was passed by a vote of 10 in favor, 2 abstentions. Karen Longeteig requested that a statement about biodiversity be added to the draft before it is sent to the CPG. John Andrews also suggested that we need to add conservation/preservation of wetlands to our draft. Agenda Item 7. Tom Harden noted that there are two versions of the draft vision statement on the floor for the group's consideration -- one proposed by Mike Hanauer and another proposed by Marianne Lazarus. When invited to identify areas of difference in the two versions, Marianne said that in her version, she tried to work from the general to the specific, based on our goals matrix. She also noted that she believed that Mike's version included things that hadn't been discussed by the group. Mike said that he had tried to include some of the thinking that went into our decisions in his draft. mailbox:/Macintosh%20 H D/System%20Folder/ Preferences/Netscape%20Users/ Monday,May 22, 2000 Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/ Page:4 16 meeting Karl Kastorf moved, and John Frey seconded, that the group use Mike's version to submit to the CPG on the following day. The motion passed 9 in favor, 2 opposed. Further discussion by the group led to the agreement that Mike's version will be the one that group members should base their suggestions for changes and addtions. Mike will be the editor of the vision statement, and people who submit changes/additions should try to be as specific as possible in their suggested wording. Agenda Item 8. Lee Sinai asked Karl Kastorf why the changes to goal 1 that she had sent him were not added to the current draft. Karl explained that there was some confusion on his part about who was submitting the changes. He and Lee agreed to meet after the group meeting to work out the details of the required changes so they could be included in the draft to be submitted the following day. Suzanne noted that there were a couple of objections to the use of a specific percentage (10%) in the wording of goal 5, objective 5.1. Several members of the group expressed the opinion that the objective could be reworded to just require an increase in the amount of affordable housing. Other members expressed the opinion that the 10% mentioned in the objective was desirable (even though ambitious) , in order to maintain diversity in Lexington. Suzanne moved, and Larry Belvin seconded, that the wording of objective 5.1 be changed to remove the specific percentage. The motion was passed by 9 in favor, 1 opposed, and 1 abstention. Mike Hanauer noted that he agrees with Tom Harden's suggestion that comments about regional cooperation be added to goal 6. Mike asked the group to give him suggestions for additions about regional cooperation. Several group members expressed the opinion that many of the objectives of goal 6 are too ambiguous and that it is unclear what they are supposed to achieve. Mike explained that the puLpose of the goal was to ensure that processes are put in place to make sure that the goals and objectives coming out of the Lexington 2020 exercise are achieved over time. Several group members encouraged Mike to make the objectives more specific in their wording. It was agreed that the current version of the goal m ai Ibox:/Macintosh%20 H D/System%20Folder/ Preferences/Netscape%20Users/ Monday,May 22, 2000 Managing Growth Working Group Minutes for 5/ Page:5 16 meeting will be submitted the following day to the CPG, but that changes will be required for the final draft. Agenda Item 9. Karl asked group members to send him, as a Word document, a complete list of group members so it can be submitted with the draft report. Tom Harden proposed that we use the input from the meeting with CPG on 5/23 and a discussion of priorities at our next group meeting on 5/30 as input to our final drafts, which will be discussed on 6/6. The meeting adjourned at 9:05 pm. Respectfully submitted, Suzanne Caton mailbox:/Macintosh%20HD/System%20Folder/ Preferences/Netscape%20Users/