HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-07-21-SPRD-min SPECIAL PERMIT RESIDENTIAL DISTRICT MEETING MINUTES
July 21, 2020
Call to Order: A public hearing of the SPRD was held remotely through Zoom. The meeting
convened at 8:03AM
Members in Attendance: Jill Hai, Chair; Richard Canale; Scott Cooper; Heather Hartshorn;;
Joyce Murphy, Richard Perry; Taylor Singh; Betsy Weiss; Wendy Manz
Staff in Attendance: Katherine Scotti, Planning Intern; Carol Kowalski
Others in Attendance: Ted Brovitz; Jennifer Van Campen, Executive Director, Metro West
Collaborative
AGENDA ITEM:
Jennifer Van Campen, Executive Director, Metro West Collaborative
DOCUMENT(S):
Power point- `Building Affordable Housing"
SUMMARY:
Jennifer speaks of how affordable housing happens: Inclusionary zoning, 4013s (most often
used), Municipal land, public money, municipal programs.
MEMBER COMMENTS:
Jill Hai, Chair, is interested to know what Jennifer's experience has been working with Lexhab
and what they could be doing to support this type of work in town. Jennifer states the projects
are small and they fit into neighborhoods easily. But it makes it hard to leverage other state
resources. Lexington has missed opportunities because the state is not interested in anything less
than 10 units. Lexhab is finding it's hard to manage less than a 10 unit project.
Richard Canale: Contractors don't have a by right to do Chapter 40B. What are the opportunities
to do local initiative petition? Jennifer thinks its good tool.
Carol Kowalski: Wants to know what the difference is between project eligibility letter vs local
initiatives projects. Jennifer states with local initiative there is no state subsidies vs project
eligibility letter there is state subsidies.
Scott Cooper asks Jennifer if she ever gets involved in projects that are under market that would
not meet the standards of affordability. Jennifer states they don't. The higher income brackets
are hard to serve. The idea is to create smaller units to make them more affordable.
PUBLIC COMMENTS:
None
AGENDA ITEM:
Ted Brovitz-Zoning Examples
DOCUMENTS:
PowerPoint Presentation
SUMMARY:
Ted speaks of the zoning examples from other communities intended to create affordable
housing and diversification of the housing stock via power point presentation
MEMBER COMMENTS:
Richard Canale: Overlay districts and housing in town center are going to give Lexington the
best opportunities to create the housing they want
Scott Cooper: Is Newbury doing better with affordable units than Lexington? Ted says they
have more affordable units.
Joyce Murphy: Agrees with Richard. It's difficult to compare to other towns. Noticed there isn't
a lot of opportunity for two families and ask if that could be modified.
Betsy Weiss- Agrees with Joyce regarding the two families.
AGENDA ITEM:
Approval of Meeting Minutes
MOTION:
Move to accept four sets of minutes as distributed, and seconded.
ADJOURN (9:36am)