Zoning & Planning Committee - September 14, 2026

Thanks for watching!

Ms. Wolf from the Planning Department, and we're also joined by Councilor Brooks, not a member of the committee. And I think that's it for the staff. and some sort. So I want to talk a little bit about how we're going to proceed tonight. We have an agenda that has got a lot of opportunity for sharing information, but we're going to begin with an appointment

of 67 horse-eared women, as a member of the Conservation Commission for a term to expire April 7th, 2027. And Mr. Mendick you are here virtually and we're delighted to see you in any capacity so. I'm happy to be here. Thanks for having me. Thank you. So it is customary, we have your extensive resume, but it's customary to ask about a little of your background and your interest in serving this capacity. and so on.

Sure, up until about a year ago I worked for the US National Park Service. I spent 35 years with the service working in environmental compliance from the Northeast region So I covered projects in park units from Maine to Virginia. I coordinated environmental impact statements, other internal permanent compliance, external permitting with the Nature and Species Act Army. Corps of Engineers, EPA Water Quality. Before that I spent two years as the Conservation Administrator for the town of Lexington and for that I went to Lowen Graduate School at Vermont Law School. And, you know, I've been involved with a number of different conservation organizations over the years. And this seems like an opportunity now that I'm retired to give a little back to the city I've been living in and raised my family in since we moved here in 1997.

Wonderful. Thank you. And I know a little bit about Vermont Law School, too, and there are a bunch of wonderful people up there.

I just want to say thank you for stepping up and with your great background, I think you're going to be a big plus to the committee. So thank you very much.

Thank you. Goetz.

Well, he's in Ward 5, so when the moment comes I will move to nominate you. The 35 plus years with the National Park Service is incredible. and your work as an attorney working with the Massachusetts Wetland Protection Act compliance, as well as you being the Park Service's negotiator in dam removal settlements was just outrageous. So I appreciate your background, and we're super lucky to have you. And so thank you so much for offering your time and your willingness to serve.

You're very welcome. Happy to do it.

Councilor Oliver? Thank you, Chair. Thank you sir pleasure to meet you and I'll echo the sentiment thanking you for your willingness to serve. I am curious do you spend much time following All the activities going on here in Newton. We have a dam project, I think, going on and some other things. And I'm just curious what interested you in kind of signing up?

Well, the dam project I have followed that. I do follow a number of dam removal projects I was involved and a small one out in Concord. I've been involved with them all over the Northeast in my capacity with the Park Service. And, you know, I get the mayor's weekly notes which I read every week and I spend a fair amount of time walking the trails and paddling the Charles River. And again, being retired a little over a year, I wanted to spend a little A little more time getting back into this kind of process, a governmental process. And so this seemed like an ideal way to get involved and offer my assistance and get a better sense of what's going on with the city and help the city as well as the people that come before the commission.

Great, thank you for that. I appreciate it. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Councilor Albright?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I'm going to add my thank you to you for being willing to serve with your extensive background is amazing. I was wondering if you've been following the Conservation Commission and if you have any areas of particular interest or concern as you get started here.

Well, I'm certainly interested in the process associated with the dam removal and the work that's over near. I guess it's pretty close to City Hall and any projects in and around the Charles River and just to get a better sense of the wetlands in town as well as the different projects that are ongoing. Our house is up on a hill, I'd like to stay in a neutral place where I can, but I just want to get a little bit more involved with the The inner workings of the city. I don't have any political aspirations, but I do want to keep focused on conservation and preservation and historical resources, of course. We have a lot of those.

Thank you very much.

Sure.

Any other questions? I don't see any. Councilor Goetz?

I'd like to move approval.

So, Councilor Getz has moved approval. All those in favor will say aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstention? The ayes have it's unanimous. What will happen, Mr. Mendick, is that our recommendation will go to the full council at its next meeting and it's customary that those are approved usually as part of a larger vote on first call so you wouldn't be called out for a specific mention but We expect you to be voted, and then you can begin service in due course. But we're grateful. I also note that you have done work on golf courses. And if you're comfortable sharing your email with the clerk I'll send you a short article about why more attorneys should play golf.

That would be great. Yeah, I've been involved with a couple of golf course restorations National Historic Landmark designations, national historic districts associated with golf and country clubs.

Are there three lawyers who don't play golf?

Well, let's put it this way. A lot of people pick up a club and walk around. What they do with it is another story.

All right. Well, I've only been playing 50 years so I'm not very good.

Join that club. All right, thank you very much.

Thank you so much. Take care everybody.

Have a good night. The next item before we get to discussion is 29026 And before any discussion, I just want to mention for the committee and the public who are attending a little background. You recall in the spring we took up some issues related to the demolition of homes in Newton and then during the summer We worked on other matters and part of the effort I wanted to bring to the committee was some work that's been done over the summer. That would help inform our discussion on potential specific responses And so, for example, when questions come up I would ask members of the committee to have them certainly forward them to me and to the clerk. And if necessary we will forward them people who made presentations but just be careful not to forward them around because then we get into an open meeting problem and I'd rather avoid that if we can.

But my intention as part of this committee process is to work through some potential issues that we can think about in responding to those as we go forward. And starting really with the demolition delay work, which will pick up next week or next meeting and begin that conversation and then maybe move to some zoning conversations later But in the meantime, I thought it was important to have some background that we could discuss in the committee of what information we've been able to find over the summer about how Homes have been demolished in the city and what has happened to their replacements. So that's, let me read this item into the record. It's item 29026 discussion of data about demolition of homes in Newton and their replacements Baker, Wright, Oliver, Malakie, Irish, Farrell, Dahmubed, Gordon, Block and Getz requesting discussion and analysis of the data about the demolition of homes in Newton and their replacements.

So this is really Councilor Wright's Hard work along with the work. We had an intern in the summer, Sam Gelber who was a student and spent a fair amount of time and we very much are grateful to him. I sent him an email that we were doing this tonight, but he's gone off to college so he may not be able to even watch us virtually. But I'm going to turn over the conversation to Councilor Wright make her presentation and then we'll open it up for conversation. We've been joined by Ms. Callello virtually. and other people. I'm sorry, the planning director has come in. She's very, excuse me, yeah. My apologies. Back at home at 10 p.m. is not... No, no, it's just a colleague of yours All right, thank you.

So this and I'll come up to it is slightly different from what's in the packet and it's just adding some more points on the map and breaking up one of the tables a little bit more, some coloring too. So this summer we both Sam and I, and Sam started it off and then he had other things to do. And so I kind of picked it up after that but we wanted to study the teardowns from 2020 Let me see, 2022 or 2021 through 20 on 2021 to 2026. And what I did was we first started with the assessors database and That is 33,021 rows and 218 columns.

It's a massive spreadsheet. And trying to get what were teardowns in that and pulling those out and then kind of backtracked and got from ISD all the demolitions that they have given, granted. in that timeframe. And then, so then we layered the assessor's database on that and then using outside sources like Zillow and realtor websites and things like that. And I'll go into a little bit more detail where we needed other places So the big thing, we go to the next one. Next slide. So this is pretty much overall is it was 402 homes It keeps increasing because every week we get more demolitions.

So it was over 400 and the average price was 1.25 million that have been demolished. and they have been replaced by so far 239 new homes selling on the average of 4 million. And I included in that 14 rentals, so those are completed homes and then there was 149 homes that are still a process. So they may have demoed the house, and nothing started or restarted to build or they haven't yet Thank you for joining us today. Northland and, um, our president and things like that. And we were only looking at residential.

So I pulled those out and then there was what I call 15 15 listings that didn't have sufficient data. And then that number was higher, but the more digging I went, I could find more and kind of fill it out. But because it wasn't all there, I left those out. Next. So the demolished homes, 58% of them has less than 2,000 GLA which is gross living area. According to assessor's database that is defined typically the first and second floor minus any garage that might be on the first floor That's the gross living area. It's, FAR is slightly different and the assessor's database doesn't track that.

This is the... Oh, floor-area ratio.

And that usually includes the garage or and if it's on the first floor and may or may not include some of the attic and may the basement and but generally it's the first and second floor. So GLA in general, the difference between GLA and FAR just a general high levels that means every single time is the same thing is GLA doesn't have the garage and FER would have a garage, but there's other nuances to it. And you have to look at by case-by-case basis. The medium demolished home was 1,866 square feet which is a common size for a three bedroom single family home. Most of these were built before 1960, a lot of them more modest capes and colonials and ranches

The average new build was 4,785 square feet GLA which is almost two and a half times bigger than the original one. size of those homes. So when you look at a realtor, the listing includes generally all the living space so if there's any in the attic or in the basement that's conditioned it's usually a lot bigger than that and 33% of the homes exceeded 5,000 square feet. These are definitely not modest homes. You know, these are much, much bigger and this is a kind of a shift of the housing types in Newton And I'm sorry to take a step back, but how we started this years ago is we as counselors have concerns from residents on the demolition of homes and loss of tree cover there.

are being replaced by much more larger and expensive homes. And a lot of these homes are perfectly fine. They might be a little bit dated, might have an older kitchen but These could be starter homes. Yes, they're pretty high priced but when you buying a house for 1.2 million and replacing it with something that's three and a half billion big difference of who can afford that? and in the past, the city council has addressed some of these things. Like we've done retaining walls, limiting retaining walls without a special permit if they're over four feet or a certain distance We measure height from the original grade, not what developers or builders have built up. And we limited the facade ratio which all of this helps What's being built, but doesn't necessarily help from reducing the demolitions. So let's go a little bit deeper dive into things. Let's go to the next one.

Next page. Like I said here, these are my data sources. We started with Assessor's Database which is huge and then we got the list of demos and kind of pulled out the demos from Assessors database And then the assessor's database doesn't have everything. Like if the house has already been torn down and rebuilt, the GLA of the old house is not there. So I would need to either take a look at the house and see if the house next door is similar. I might use that GLA or I find the listing, but usually the listings includes the basement and attic, but not necessarily. So some of this data, especially GLA, that earlier one for the original house a few of them are more estimates There's so much data here, it's close enough.

And we're not looking at the minute details but the overall broad spectrum of what's happening here. Let's see. Okay, next one. So this is so the one that I'm working with most of times 430 rows and 124 columns. This is just a snapshot of just some of it so you can get an idea, some of the data that I have in here. It has The latest sale date, what it's sold for. And if it's just listed, that's I got from the internet from a realtor website or Zelle. I have the ISD demo permit date. I have the original purchase date and then lot square footage and how many units are going in there, some of my notes. and then on the right is the list square feet.

So what the realtor listed as a square feet, GLA that's actually in the assessor's database The original GLA. And again, and you can see the little note, some of it I had to get from a neighboring house or find it on their internet might've been a little bit larger than it is by a realtor. And so this, and this is the core of what I was using for this but there's a lot more in here Like I said, there's 218 columns. So using some of that data too for some of the analysis. Okay, let's go to the next one.

We promise we don't have to read all 218

So this is, so 402 is the demo number. So you're going to keep seeing it adding up to 402. So here you can see by the zoning type. And then I kind of split it what's sold or listed so it's already built, or some of them are going into rentals and then the other one is kind of in the pipeline so they haven't finished the work. And those are usually sold later So there, you know, it does take some time to do this. So the earlier ones are from the earlier sales and then the ones in the pipeline from later sales. Okay next Okay, so this is all the demos put on the map by address geocode and also the type of

Zoni. As you can see from my original map, I have a love-hate relationship with Claude and Claude on the web even though I have an account and Claude in the app, two different things. And John has told me about it and boy, it's a big difference. So the first time I did this I used Claude on the web. And Claude had problems with an accessibility database because the address money had street-street twice and didn't know what to do, and things like that. So there was missing about 50 50 of the demos, but it gave a good idea. So the second time coming through here and I updated just yesterday so this is the updated map from what was on Friday's about 50 more new ones A few of them were added since August. The original map was from August because we've had some more demos, but I'm not catching all of them, but catching a few of

but you can kind of see a little bit of the trend or where we have demos all across the city, they're grouped in different areas and different types like you know the SR3 are up in West Newton on the flats or down in Oak Hill Park where there's a lot of them. You can see the MRs are in Nonantum type of area. So, and each one of those dots is yeah, it's an address.

Just point out that some of the areas that are historic districts don't have demos in them because they don't generally occurred within a historic district.

Yeah, yeah even though the next one lists Chestnut Hill with an MR or with a demo I have no idea where that is okay so the next So originally, so this is the problem with assessor's database. It doesn't call out separately Oak Hill, Oak Hill Park, Momentum and Newton Corner and The first three is all part of Newton Center, so that's why last Friday's numbers look huge. But if you look at the map, you can really see is what's being torn down. And this is a rough estimate so I worked with the assessing department how to kind of come up and figure out and pull out Oak Hill and Oak Hill Park. And for those two, I use the wards. And I think Oak Hill park we use

Ward 8, Precinct 4 and Oak Hill is 81 82 and 83. Now there might be a few you know Upper Falls Newton Highlands in that number but it's roughly this is just to give you a rough idea of what's being torn down and where. I pulled out Thompsonville, I just blew up my map and counted it and then just took it from Newton Center but separately though is Newton Corner, that is probably Part of Nonantum and Newtonville. And I didn't know which way to do it, so I'm just... It's kind of as a note. And they had like 10 teardowns. And again, it depends how or where you defined it And this is not an exact science here. This just gives you a rough overall idea of where things are happening and which ones are being turned down and where. So if you take a look at MR1,

So you have a lot in Nonantum and Newtonville, and Newton Center and Newton Upper Falls. and SR1, you know West Newton which is probably West Newton Hill and Oak Hill close to you know over there by the hill itself so it gives you a rough idea where these are. Okay, next. So also there's averages and medium and to see how these numbers came out is... I wanted to know how many of each of those listings there are and also gave a range. If there is one outlier that really skewed things and there's only a handful of data points, that can make a huge difference. for the most part this is is pretty on.

So you can see the first purple column, that's your GLA gross living area which again is basically usually the 1st and 2nd floor minus any garage And then the new one, the next column is what's rebuilt and that's the GLA. I gave a range of that. And you can see the And then in the third purple column is the average for the listing size. So if you just take an SR1, the GLA, so what we see in the assessor's database, is 5803 on average for but the average from all the living space what the realtor does and that's not exact science either is over 9,000 square feet. If you look at SR3 it's 3,900

The new GLA, but the actual listing is 5759 which is a lot bigger. And the size from before to the list size, you can see over three times as much. And the BU are kind of outliers because they don't have the same type of zoning as we do so they're a much, much bigger. size-wise and how many units and things like that.

Clinton Street.

Yeah, Clinton Street is on there but there's even some other ones too yeah okay next and this is now sale price. And again, kind of doing the same thing you know, the average sale price, the range and then the average recent sale price and SR1, the average was 2 million. And the average new is 6.2 million. SR3, the averages 975,000 and the new ones are 3 million. The MR1s and 2s, I added both of those so it depends How many units it had, but for the average recent sale price, it's the total price of the whole building. So if they have... So for MR1, for instance, they sold it for 1.2. Typically, you know, the condos may go for if you have two units

might be $2 million or 1.8 and let's say it's 2 million so two of them for that building would be 4 million total. So the multipliers of you know what was original price versus The new sales, you can see it on the right there. Okay, next. And these are just some examples and our intern went in much, much more detail but we're just putting some basics to take a look at. And so you can go to the next one

Well, your point about the façade ratio, just let me explain that.

So the façaade ratio came into effect I think is it March of this year? And so the fa-façade ratios 60%. The front of the house can't be more than 60% of the front of a lot, except if you go 20 feet behind and expand it a little bit more. So some of these houses they were built before March um following the facade ratio but they could still put the same volume on the lot so I would have expected that they would you know put more in the back or whatever a lot of these houses um are up to the maximum FAR. They're building to the max FAR, usually within a quarter or two. Okay so this is just one single family house you can see It was $1.6 million and it went from 2374 to 5706, which is over twice as big and sold for $5.3 million. Next?

Here's another one. It's SR2 sold for $1.8 million and then a little over double, two-and-a-half times the size and sold for 7.2 million. This is SR3, smaller one 1.2 million and then sold for 3.7 single family This one here is another single family, this Lower Falls. So for 910 and over two, 2 1⁄2 times and so far about 3 million.

and another one down in Oak Hill Park sold for $1.1 million originally, and then replaced with a house that was three, three-and-a-half times bigger and sold for 3.3 million. and this is Langley. And so, this was a two-family 1892 family that sold for 1.5 million Very small, 1252 or two family. And on the right it was a special permit and they have three condos so that's you know about what five times bigger than the original house three condos been listed for over seven million total and then rentals so this that kind of fell upon as you're doing all this

Internet Search, and trying to find list price and sale price because it says there's databases like a few weeks behind the sales in that. So Coming up is I'm putting things in. I'm getting some of the rentals, and the thing is that I have rentals. So when I have an opening it's up there but when it gets filled it's gone so even though these rentals I have out there right now if you went to look at them you know, they're probably already filled and so they're not up there.

You have a question or hand raised?

I'm happy to wait till the end.

If you don't mind, I'd like to let her get through.

Yeah, no problem.

Thank you.

And so that other 15 line items that I didn't group anywhere They might be rentals. That's why I don't find a final sale price or anything like that, but if it's filled already, I don' t know, I do not see a rental price on it. So yeah, so before we had a house here it was two family and sold for one million. And this is Upper Falls and they put in two condos Each condo sold for a total of $3.5 million, so about $1.7 million for each condo and now one of the condos is rented for over $14,000 a month Next. This one, okay this is one of the few houses I think probably should have been torn down and probably was condemned and it was an 1890 house. And you can see the price sold for $450,000.

They put four condos on there total so each of the condos were roughly two million dollars each and then one of the is being rented or it's listed for eleven thousand a month. This is a single family house. Again, this is Ward 8 and it sold originally for $1.5 million We did put a new house on there, 3.65 million is sold as a newhouse and now it's rented at 16,000 a month.

That's a lot.

Yes, it is. Oh, there's even worse. I didn't put the worst ones up there. 24,000. I don't even have those up there This here, this didn't even get sold. So the developer bought the house in Nantum for 1.2 million, put on two townhouses that he's renting and he rents each of them for almost $11,000. Each of them. And there's a few people who just do this, too. I'm seeing more and more that they're tearing it down, putting up condos, and just renting them. So they don't even sell them. They just rent.

Thank you, and I want to again thank Sam Gelber in absentia for his time and effort. We've been joined as a member of the committee by Councilor Kalis. Thank you very much. Wright, and I will now open it up for questions. I saw Councilor Albright had a question. Councilor

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So first question is and thanks for fixing some of that data it's a little clear tonight but did you use zip code originally to do the village listing?

Now, so there is a – oh, I didn't bring my sheet on it. There's a listing in the assessor's database and let's see, what is it called? It is called – Um...

Yeah, something like that.

There's a certain code in there and but it includes which I was found surprising Newton Center included everything down to the Boston line. and so it didn't break out Oak Hill, Oak Hill Park, Thompsonville. And so I was talking to Mr. Shaughnessy today about how we can pull it out. So again, it's not granular, but you get a rough idea. And using the precincts I did try to look at zip code but Newton Center again is almost that whole area as a zip code, so that didn't work either. And then trying to figure out Thompsonville, there weren't a lot. And who defines what Thompsonville is versus the other one? So I just kind of went in there and took a look. Yeah, I did.

Well, I'm not going to do it. Just let me know.

And then same with Newton Corner. But Newton Corner, at least in New Thompsonville came out of the Newton Center's number but Newton Corner's numbers could come out of Newtonville. or Nonantum, so I didn't know where to pull it from. So I just kind of left that at the bottom and was not a big number. So they had like 10 teardowns there.

So the other, it's a part of Newtonville that is 02459. That probably there's a piece of Newton bill that's got numbers in the Newton Center group. That's my guess.

Yes. And again, I didn't go through with the assessors today to really break down how they figure all these little things out. But I'm very shocked that some of the villages aren't pulled out at all and actually Nonantum is not really pulled out either, but If you look at it, all the things that just said Newton was nonantum. So we just put that into the nonantium bucket. But the math is the thing. If you look at the map, that's right. And he took all those 400 lines of addresses and put a dot in the type of zoning exactly where it's supposed to be in the city. So, the map is correct.

I think if you give the map or the actual addresses to Doug Greenfield with the GIS, he can give it back to us by Warden Precinct which might be useful.

Yeah, it's in the data there. I could do Ward increasing but you know Some of them overlap, you know? So it isn't an exact science. It's just to give you a rough idea what's going on. If you look at the map, you'll see that because can you tell me where exactly Newton Lower falls and Oak Hill? What's the separation between those two, you know? Where is the line? Yeah.

So and GLA, is that a number from the database? Yes.

And you see it all the time. It's gross living area. And if you look at the definition of it um it says it's the first and second floor minus a garage okay and but but Sometimes talking to Jim, he says sometimes they do include a third four as a GLA but not always. Unfortunately it's not You can't tell by the assessor's database what they're exactly including in the GLA.

When they give you numbers in their database, I think it's effective area, gross building and building area Why didn't you choose like the building area is the one closest to what when I look at my house, it's one closest To what my house actually I think of as the gross area of my house. Why wouldn't you use that number?

Generally, the GLA is the closest to FAR. Like I said, because I wanted to kind of bring it back to the FAR. And so KLA is the first and second floor usually, first and 2nd floor minus the garage. So I was looking at okay let's go see and I started down the list of 400 things who has a garage, is it in the basement? Is it on the first floor? Do we add it back in to kind of figure out A rough idea for FAR. Now, as you know, for FAR, the basement is part of it if it's exposed, if it on a hill but that's not most of them and then most of the builders nowadays know how to not include the third floor into the FVR. You know, they played a little bit of the game so that it's less than 50% of the floor below. So therefore I won't count and seven feet and the whole bit. I wanted to kind of go back to the FAR, so that's why I was using the GLA.

And like I said, for the most part it is your first and second floor.

So interesting. piece of data that I would love to have would be how many small houses on small lots or small houses and big lots that didn't get torn down. How much did they sell for over the last five years? Because then we'll understand what the premium is for the teardown issue. Did they sell significantly less than the ones that got torn down or are they about the same? I would love to know if there is a premium in what developers are paying for these teardowns.

I think, go ahead. Can I just clarify that real quick? Sure. Small homes on large lots and then compare two groups, ones that were torn down or replaced or just sold as is

Whatever small houses were sold over the last five years, regardless of the size of their lot. What did they sell for? versus what did the ones that tore down sell for so we could learn if there's a premium, if the developers are paying a premium to get these houses quickly and tear them down. I think it might be useful to know.

This is something I can use with Claude.

I'm sorry, people are waving at me.

I just have one last question and it's not really a question, it's more of a comment. So this is interesting data. I mean, it's confirming what we already knew. And Mr. Chair, this is sort of directed at you, I think maybe or all of us, actually. One of the things if we're going to get ourselves to a proposed solution or a proposed outcome I really think we need to talk as a committee about what we would like to see as an outcome You know, do we want less teardowns? Is that the only thing? Do we want tear downs and smaller houses to be built? Teardowns, but as long as you build two houses instead of one that's okay. So I would love to have what are the options that we could get to as a proposed outcome from this study, and what do we think of the committee of those?

As a straw vote to give guidance to the planning department about what outcome we're looking for here. So I think that this is after we have the data analysis and so forth, but it's just a very important part of this whole process is understanding what it is we want to have happen at the end of the day.

I appreciate that. Other questions? Let me go to the Councilor Guest and then we're going to take members of the committee first.

Okay, thank you so much for this work. It's an incredible accomplishment and it's like hooray to the two of you. I commend you to no end. Now I'm trying to get to the place where what does it tell us? You know, because I sort of feel as if you can start looking at just a high level sort of information. But a little bit to what Councilor Opelart was getting too but mostly even in terms of What I'm seeing is that which slots are the most vulnerable? Which homes in the community of the most at risk, you know, the SR2s and MR1s are jumping out. OK, so I then need to we even need to do a deeper dive in the sense of like the corollary between what can be built on those lots and how they extrapolate to dollars.

in terms of the builders, you know, in terms that factor fold that you were just showing how much of an increase in terms purchase price to what they're selling for. So that's an interpretation of what the market will provide, in a sense of what developers see as the most profitable flipping of properties. So I just sort of feel as if, you know, this is giving us a preliminary sort of overview of content and we need it in terms of just even being able to ask those kinds of questions. but I also wonder whether or not any sort of other opportunities present themselves through the analysis of this data.

Let's just take that as a, to be continued question.

Correct, it's just that you know the first pass at this and just sort of what is it saying? What is it telling us?

And I just said a comment and knowing how much effort went into this as far as i know this is The planning department did some wonderful work earlier on some examples and doing some analysis, but this for the best of my knowledge is the first attempt to try and get at a whole universe of what's happened over the last five years what is as best we can determine, before and after. We haven't isolated causes, we haven't done anything it's just saying there is a change in the housing stock going on by degrees, by demolition being replaced by bigger and more expensive homes. We know that intuitively. And that's why people have been asking us to deal with this question. That's why we have this item before us But knowing much more about the specifics and where they are, what kind of they are. And all of that is really I think advanced our understanding now again where we go with that it's going to be another conversation but I do want to make sure we get kind of questions out.

Councilor Gordon and then Councilor Oliver?

Thank you, Chair.

Oh, I thought you had your hand up. Sorry. And then I'll go to Council.

So Council Albright said that this confirms what we already knew First, I want to really thank you for this incredible deep dive here. And this is way worse than what I knew anecdotally. The pricing that you showed us from purchase price either rentals or what the developers are getting is astonishing to me. And I really think that Newton's moving in the wrong direction, in terms of affordability. Just to Raina's point, figuring out where we go with that was very surprising. And also to the point about wondering about premiums, Pam, I don't know if you want to share but you were telling me about a house that sold recently where the owners had put in all of this extra money to make their house, and I know people who do this so they can sell their house for more. And it is not a deterrent to a developer to then take all new things

and still tear down the house. And that feels so wasteful to me.

Yeah, that example. And actually I went back in and this is with ISD. It says when we, when the files were loaded in, but they were files from a few years ago. So they didn't recently update it. But still I mean this one It's on a very big lot, and I think it's an SR1. And yeah, it's a little less than an acre. And it sold for $2.2 million. to a developer. And the house, the GFA on that house was 3372 square feet and the developer is building an 11,300 square foot home on it. He's tearing that down and putting that on there. From what I've been looking at, that's going to list for Obertempo in that house.

You also found the Owners were putting $100,000 or $200,000 into a house.

Yeah, they did this one. I thought they did it right before because that's when the drawings were put into the ISD database. But then when I opened the drawings, the date on them were a couple years earlier. So there I learned my lesson that I can't just look at what ISD said they uploaded the file in 2022 means I thought okay It was from around that time, but it was actually a couple years previous. So this was, I have to say, there's a lot of clicks and you got to go down so many different levels. And finding the data in that was tedious.

To say this is a deep dive is an understatement. How's the Roche?

Nobody else in the room? I'm very mindful of protocol.

But I recognize you.

Thank you. OK, so great work. I share a lot of Susan's questions. And I want to build on some of them, Councilor Albright. So this strikes me as further validating what we already know, which is small lots, something large houses, large lots are vulnerable to redevelopment. And One of the things that I'd like to kind of raise as a thought is large lot zoning has been around for over 50 years. These small homes have been around or in some cases, over 40, 50 years. What has changed is market demand, right? 40 years ago

there was not a demand for 4,500 square foot home, 5,000 square foot at home. We're now seeing that right? The problem we have is a problem of market demand. I agree wholeheartedly with Councilman Borden that this is not the kind of housing we want, but understanding that it is market demand that is driving this and that is our problem. Any other issue as a cause of this has pre-existed for at least 50 years, okay? Point the second The goals, there are many goals that we've talked about. I'm with Councilor Gordon 100% on this. I think we should be laser focused on creating or preserving or preserving and creating smaller homes, modest homes. And I think 2000 square feet feels like a good bogey.

but we've also talked about other issues including aesthetics, sizes of the buildings, trees. I think we need to as a group As a council, obviously I'm not on ZAP that's going to do the first cut at this but we need to have a set of goals that are prioritized. Why do we want to... What is it we're trying to accomplish by Reducing teardowns and redevelopment or changing the nature of tear downs and redevelpment? Okay. You would get to it, Councilor. Baker, right? What is the cost of achieving whatever goals that we want to achieve. And I think Councilor Albright's question And that is, what are the comparables?

What are the comps on properties that are not ripe for redevelopment? Small houses on small lots. A bunch of them in my neighborhood that are there. They're built out to the FAR and all the other relevant constraints, and they sell for $1 million, $2 million, Is there a premium for that development opportunity or not? And that cuts both ways. If there's a premium, then there's an indirect... There's a direct subsidy If it's not then our efforts to maintain these homes as affordable looks a little sus because

Trying to maintain a $1.5 million home is affordable, just that's not affordable. It's barely attainable. Okay so Knowing the dates of original sales would be useful information to counselor write comps on similar properties. The other subsidy that is relevant here is the tax subsidy, right? What would be really useful to know is what does the tax What are the tax receipts on these homes pre-sale and what are the taxes receipts of these homes post sale? Because again, we need to understand our goals relative to their costs if we're going both make good decisions and sell those decisions to the public, right? If you've tripled

maintain so-called attainable homes at $1.5 million. That doesn't strike me necessarily of Revenue. Okay, so pre-tear down tax receipts post replacement tax receips and again coming back to what Councilor Albright said is I think we need to talk about oh I just want to make one thing clear. I don't think I was clear enough about it. I do not think the comps on small houses, on large lots that did not get redeveloped really matters much because those people are competing with developers anyway, right? So what matters is small houses on small lots. If I got a 2,000 square foot home on 5,000-square-foot lot No development opportunity. I've got a 2,000 square foot home and a 10,000-square-foot lot, I've gotta develop an opportunity if everything else

should reflect the development bonus. And that's money that if we restrict, that is going to come out of Property Owners Pocket as well. Okay, so again I want to come back to where should we be going from here? I think we really need Hammer out a list of what our priorities are because there are a lot of goals with eliminating teardowns and redevelopment that we've discussed. What are the top priorities in order? And then secondly, really nailing down, which we can figure out. Both the indirect subsidy by Lupina Comps and the direct subsidy, again a tax subsidy or sorry, the subsidy from the homeowners, which is looking at comps

and the subsidy from tax revenue, which is looking at the difference between the tax receipts before they sale and after the redevelopment sale.

So there's not many recommendations.

Oh, one of the things that getting back to your data that you want There are some people when they sell their house don't want to sell to developers. Like, when I bought my house, I was a little of a sped and so on. So that, we don't know how much or how often that is in there.

But that's I think why taking out the small house on a large lot that doesn't get redeveloped because that's noise. You can't draw a conclusion, but Developers are not in the market for small houses on small lots because they can't redevelop them. And so that's the comparable. So yes, I think that happens. Anecdotally there's plenty. It'll be very difficult to figure out when that happens plus it doesn't add anything to our understanding of the premium.

I appreciate the comment. I'm going to recommend the department here in a second, but I wanted this comment and I respectfully disagree with my colleague. We have heard time again in this community about the importance of attainable housing as well as affordable We know that. But here we have a situation where we are losing in weekly basis two or three properties that are at the lower end of our price point and provide opportunities for families to move in or rent in the city. To much more expensive houses, basically If this were a neighborhood, we'd be talking about gentrification. And we would be very much concerned about that. We wouldn't be talking premiums. We would be talking windfall. And I think it's important to understand that part of the challenge that we've been wrestling with as a committee over a long time has been that we are by degrees changing the character of the city into a higher income community.

and that is an issue that this committee and the members of council have talked about over and over again, and we're hearing from citizens all the time about it. So I agree with the term respectfully I'm referring to these as subsidies. There are choices that the community has made, we make choices when we set the available zoning and we'll hear from Mr. Lee a little bit later tonight about some of the changes in state law that affect our ability to affect zoning but my concern is that I want the committee to be able to follow through at least on the questions that have been asked us over and over again, which is can we do something about the number of teardowns and demolitions we're seeing in this city which are being replaced by larger more expensive homes? and that's where I intend to take the committee discussion.

So another point, can I have an opportunity to respond to that?

No, not right now.

Okay, that's fine.

Yeah, so it predates my time with Newton. But I do know that we have some presentations from the last couple of years on file that address some of the questions that were raised tonight. So we'd be happy to recirculate those if that would be...

Mr. Chair, could I just raise an issue?

Mr. Chair, the camera has moved so that we can't see the right side of the table if I don't know if Miles has control over that or not but it was fine before and now it's That's better. Thank you, Miles. Or I don't know who's ever doing that but thank you.

One of the assets we look for in our clerks is people with vision, and here we have it. So thank you for that. Councilor Roche I do want to let you respond. All right. Okay, I think part of what we want to do is to start this process alone and we'll figure out where we go from here but I did want again thank Councilor Wright or interned again Mr. Gelmer for taking on the task of trying to at least understand where we are. Again, where we go is a whole other question but it was certainly a surprise to me to know the scale of the difference in both size and price between what we started with, and what we've ended up with. And I think that's an important dimension of what we do as a result of that again is going to be part of our conversation. OK.

I'd like now to move to Mr. Lee. This is not a formal docket item, but I think the chair's note indicated that we often hear from our city solicitor on matters that help us understand what to do and how we can do it. The landscape has changed recently at the state level in terms of What local governments can do, at least local governments outside Boston, can do as a matter of zoning power. And I'd ask Mr. Lee if he'd be willing to give us a briefing on some of those changes so that we can Think about where we're going, but I wouldn't expect us to make those decisions tonight. But at least we ought to know the universe that we're working in.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Miles, can I share my screen? Yeah, you should be.

Is this part of the discussion?

Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. I just had an entertain a motion to hold 271-26. All those in favor? Thank you for reminding us. Can we get a bigger shot of that? No, everyone has to squint.

I'm sorry, I need to focus out.

It's like for some reason it's frozen. You've got to do better there. Give me a second.

It froze on me, so I need to now figure out how to... Okay. Is that better?

There we go.

So thank you, Mr. Chair. My name is Andrew Lee. I'm the senior assistant city solicitor here in Newton. And as the chair stated, I'm going to give you a high level overview of some recent changes to Chapter 48, the statute for zoning.

We can't see you or the slides, so let's say we have a choice of if we take you or on the slide but But a black screen is not as much fun.

It looks to us, Andrew, that you've paused your screen sharing.

I'm going to close it and then I'm Let me try it this way. I'm working on a dual monitor, so I think it's punishing me for that. Sure. Blame the technology. Isn't that the go-to?

I believe that I can plot all the time.

AI is a new scapegoat.

There we go. You got it.

Now let me bring it into the PowerPoint mode. Okay. So again, high overview. The legislation, the state legislation or legislature recently amended Chapter 48 in several respects with regards to zoning I'm going to highlight two specific changes that are very germane to the zoning planning committee and the work that you're doing, and really needs to be taken into consideration with any zoning changes that will be made or considered.

I think you've got, we're seeing presenter view not presentation view.

Is it still doing that?

It's your notes, we can see.

There's the next screen.

Yeah.

It's doing the next scream. Apologies I've done this many times and never had any issues but Let's give it a third try.

It looks like you're not in slideshow yet.

Yeah, it's making me wait a little bit after I click it. Now, is this showing the presentation as it should be or not?

No.

You know what?

It's close enough. We can see it. OK.

I'm just going to continue. Let me know if something's too small, you can't see it. I'll try and blow it up. So an important note about the amendments to Chapter 48A are that it was effective as of July 1st of this year. There is no action by the municipality or any municipality, it is just the new law. So the first item I'm going to cover are amendments chapter 48, section 6. And these have to do with nonconforming protections. I know you all know this, but I just wanted to set the baseline with regards to what illegal nonconformity is. Illegal nonconforming at its most basic level is an existing or beginning use or structure that is lawful at the time that it existed or was initially constructed or started.

But afterwards, there was a zoning amendment where that same structure cannot be built that same way. And this is important because What the statute does... Apologies, there's a significant delay every time I'm pressing the button to have it move forward.

We can see the next slide.

I know. It's like, okay. So what that non-conforming status does is it allows protections for that structure or use Meaning, of course, that structure doesn't comply with current zoning anymore because the zoning had changed. However, it's not a violation because it lawfully existed at the time that it was constructed or begun Therefore, it has this protection that it can not only exist, it can actually be enlarged or altered. But there's a process by which it needs to follow. The first major change with regards to nonconforming protections is the timing. Previously, by operation of Chapter 48, if a... Building permit or a special permit was issued prior to the first publication notice of a zoning amendment because, as you all know, a zoning Amendment requires publication in the newspaper for two consecutive weeks.

So if that special permit or building permit was issued prior to that first publication of notice for that zoning amendment, it would be protected even if it didn't comply with that new zoning that changed. That's changed now. So, now it's not a building permit or special permit that was issued but instead if the applicant or the building owner applies for building permit or special permit prior to that first notice of publication, they get that nonconforming protection. Next is I explained that there's a process by which A nonconforming use or structure can be extended or altered. Prior to the amendments of Chapter 48, that process required approval by the special permit granting authority, which in case of newness is city council.

and what the city council would have to find is they would have that whatever that alteration or extension of that non-conforming user structure is, couldn't be substantially more detrimental than the existing non-performing user structure. It's known colloquially as a Section 6 finding, and I'm sure you've heard that term before. So that is the standard that's applied by the City Council when they are considering a change of an existing non-conforming use. For many legal nonconformities, the standard hasn't changed. The process hasn't change. You still need approval of the city council to extend or alter that nonconforming except in some very key respects. And this, I think is the biggest change with regards to the treatment of legal non-conformities. If your structure is not conforming because of lot size or shape Thank you for joining us.

To be clear, this doesn't mean that you don't need a special permit or any change for for anything that otherwise would require special permits. So, for example, if you have a building that is non-conforming as to FAR but it's also not conforming as to the setback You would still have to go to the city council if you're going to expand that nonconformity as to FAR and the setback because you still need a Section 6 finding for that extension or alteration of the setbacks. If you are expanding the FAR, non-conforming FAR and you're for example building a retaining wall that's greater than four feet. You still have to go to city council for that special permit relief for the retaining wall The only thing that you're allowed to do by right is to expand the nonconformity as to FAR, for example. Also any extension or alteration that could be done by right

that change still has to comply with the dimensional regulations in effect and zoning for the building height stories as well as a setback. Here's a graphic that was actually put together by the planning department. They did a great job just demonstrating what these kinds of FARs couldn't, or I'm sorry, what these kind of non-conformities could look like and then the pathways that are available if they want to do a change to it. So for example, I'm going to use the floor area ratio because I think is the easiest one If you have, again, a structure that exceeds the current floor area ratio but it is a legally nonconforming structure. You could expand, extend that are the legally non-performing FAR without any city council approval. So you could do it by right, but you can only build it up to the setbacks

The allowable setbacks as well as the allowable height and stories that are allowed under the current zoning. So now moving on to the second item, the second change of chapter 48 that has some impact with regards to considerations. Yes.

Hang on a second before you go to various I just want to pause and go back to the last slide for a minute, because I think there may be a couple of questions from people just to try and understand what's going on. Let me just summarize what I thought I heard you say, which is if a property is nonconforming, it can do what it wants without a Section 6 finding. as long as it stays within the envelope of the setbacks and of the height and the stories. Is that a fair summary? I mean, so height, setbacks, and stories are limiting factors for non-conforming properties now. Other things, as long as you stay within that Effective Envelope. That's basically saying how high and how much of the lot you can, you know, how far out on the lot You can go in various directions.

If you're non-conforming, you can build inside that envelope as I understand it. That's correct. I just have a couple of questions on this from first Councilor Wright, then Councilor Gatt.

So in Newton zoning what's controlling the size or the massing of the house is FAR, floor area ratio except for A single story house, which no developer really builds. And then that's block coverage. So basically let's say this example, let's a FAR for houses at 0.45 OK, that's what's in the zoning. It's 0.45. And we do have neighborhoods where the lots are small and the houses are bigger The actual FAR for that house is 0.5. So if they keep the setbacks and just the setback, they basically could do an FAR of 1.3 on that lot and yes or no, and then second.

I didn't understand one part of your fact pattern so the existing FAR is legally conforming to the zoning ordinance. It meets the requirements under the zoning ordinances, yes?

Let's say the zoning ordinance says FAR for that lot is 0.45, but the house is at 0.5.

And when the house was constructed, it was legally constructed at 0?

Yeah, well it was before F.A.R., so to go but it's now at 0.5 which is what it is there. So what I'm hearing is then they continue to build the FAR and they only have the setbacks. And our setbacks basically, I need to calculate it but I would think would give you an FAR of 1.2-1.5

That's right. They can extend that nonconforming FAR by Wright, and the limitations are going to be based on the setbacks as well as the building heighten stories.

Yeah. and right now with the FARs, yeah.

So the effective FAR could be much larger? Correct.

Can they also like add units too or no?

No, adding units isn't part of the changes to the statute's application to legal nonconformities.

Okay, so basically you just can make a giant house. Now, can they tear down?

Let him answer. You just made the giant house, right? Can they tear it down?

Yeah, of course they can tear it down. Tearing down a house does not make it lose its legal non-conforming status.

Okay so they could tear down the house that's at .5 FAR and build a house that's 1.5 FAR?

If they're meeting the setback in height and story requirement, then yes.

Okay I'll do some calculations tomorrow.

All right, are we ready to move on to variables?

Basically this is allowing the massing of the houses that everyone's complaining about to triple or quadruple what's there for houses that are non-conforming and maybe the planning department know, but I think 80% of the homes in New England are not conforming. Or 84%.

I can paraphrase what essentially this law is getting at. The more you make something nonconforming, the more freedom they have. because the goal is to make the zoning so that the lots are conforming, the properties are conformed.

But it's hard to do when you put zoning on an already built up city.

Well, he's not responsible for the change. He's just trying to make sure we understand what it is. And one more question. Is this a follow up?

Yeah, follow up. So if the lawn is conforming or non-conforming for let's say for frontage but they do conform to FAR They can extend the FAR. It doesn't matter?

No, they can only extend it but then up to the FAR if they're not already legally conforming as to FAR. Does that make sense? So then arguably speaking, if you are non-conforming as to frontage Pretty much any expansion in your house is probably going to need a Section 6 binding because there's a strong argument you're extending that non-conforming because you couldn't build on that lot anyways until, you know, under the current zoning. But if you are meeting the FAR requirements, then you have no legally nonconforming protection status for that FAR.

Okay, I think that's the one that most people are worried about.

This is a little counterintuitive, but I just want to be clear and follow up on Councilor Wright's point.

If you have a house that's underneath the Floria Ration Lab.

So the Floria ratio, say is 0.3 and your house occupies 0.2. You can't go building it in any bigger than 0. 3 because that's the allowed FAR here under it but if the FAR is 0.3 and your house was 3.1, you can build as big as you want as long as you stay within the setbacks and the stories. So not that this makes sense, folks, there's a planning policy it's just that's what the rules are we understand right?

And what was the purpose for this?

I mean, I can actually address that. In other communities they don't have this exact problem, right? Like in Foxborough where I've worked previously and Attleboro before that Where you get teardowns is typically it's not economical to replace a single family with a single-family, for example. So usually when there's a tear down of some sort and a developer wants to build something like a duplex or a small multifamily or something like that So this was intended to help those types of projects along. It was not really tailor-made for Newton's issues, so it's just Newton is I think experiencing some unintended consequences of the state regulation here.

Okay, all right. I'm sorry, I keep missing you.

It's so weird that we cannot see your face. We just see your... PowerPoint. Okay, oh now I can? Oh yay! Okay all right so my question is about the ZBA's discretionary control of this process.

We're not there yet. I need to talk about variances next Can you put this picture on top of the other slide?

Mr. Lee, I'm in section six.

I am in the existing structured uses and permits, and I'm looking at language, redline language. and I'm looking at pre-existing nonconforming structures or uses may be extended or altered provided that no such extension or alteration shall be permitted unless there is a finding by the permanent granting authority or by the special permit granting authority designated by ordinance that such change, extension, or alteration shall not be substantially more detrimental then the existing non-conforming use. So that's why I'm asking this question about ZVA you know, well why is this language there? It's in section six.

Well hold on so then it sounds to me Councilor Getz that you're conflating two things So when we're talking about the standard you just read, which I've referred to and explained as a Section 6 finding, right? Let me go back to this slide because I think it does a good job of clarifying it. Okay, so the prior law was any extension or alteration of a legally non-conforming protection requires a Section 6 finding. It requires that finding that you just read and that finding is made by the Special Permagranding Authority of the City Council in Union. So you with me there? Okay. The changes, that still applies to most extension or alterations of legal nonconformities. Except in the case when that extension or alternation of legal

frontage or lot coverage for floor area ratio. If that is the type of legal nonconformity that's afforded to that structure, that can be extended or altered by right without a section six finding, without any input from the city council.

I'm not seeing except in my language here, but it's interesting to me because it's a carve out.

I'm looking at the language right now and it says, provided however notwithstanding the foregoing pre-existing non-corner structures residential uses that do not conform to zoning because of lot size or shape frontage lock coverage etc. What I just stated so I used except to make it more clear, notwithstanding the foregoing of the language used in the statute.

Got it. Okay. So this is to me as a carve out.

It is a carve-out. It's a carve out that's making an exception for legal nonconformities that exist because of lot size or shape, frontage, lock coverage, or FAR and those ones can be extended by right.

There's an exception that has a giant swallowing sound as it expands to absorb a lot of the room. That's basically what we're saying.

Thank you.

Okay, Mr. Lee, variances. We want to get on to the rezoning.

Wait, so they can do this now?

Two days.

By right, they can go back.

That is the law of the commonwealth. Two days, yeah.

So... Amanda and the planning director stole a little bit of my thunder where at the end I was going to explain really the impact of all of these or unintended consequences. And what it means if you make a change to zoning, I'll still table that to the end but I wanted to let you know that I am going to end on that note. The other aspect of zoning that was amended are variances. So, variances are basically permission to deviate from zoning, to do something that zoning doesn't allow and the Zoning Board of Appeals here, now there's EDA. They're the body with the jurisdiction over variances to hear applications whether or not to grant a variance In the prior law, the required determination for variance, the bar was very high.

You could only get a variance if you're able to demonstrate that strict compliance with the zoning ordinance would result in substantial hardship. And that substantial hardship was due to unique conditions of the lot itself, to soil conditions, lot shape or topography of land or structures. So that was the prior law. Here's the change. The ZBA is still the permit-granting authority. However, they can grant a variance upon determination that enforcement Strict compliance would result in practical difficulty for the applicant. So a change from substantial hardship to practical difficulties. In addition, what the ZBA has to do is they have to weigh the benefits of the applicant and to the public interest. And in the statute itself, it specifically says a public interest is the production of housing.

So they have to weigh that against the detriments to the Public Health and Safety and Welfare of the affected neighborhoods. So that's the wing that they have to do to make a determination of whether or not there's practical difficulty to the applicant. and the statute goes further and says in making that balancing determination, the ZBA may consider they don't have to but they may consider The unique conditions of the law itself, the exact kind of same considerations stand by before were required to be made to make a finding of a variance. They can take into consideration the financial hardship for the petitioner They can take into consideration whether or not the petitioner can achieve the same goal through some different method, and also whether or another practical difficulty was self-created. It's really important to emphasize that they may consider these because this is not an exhaustive list.

The ZBA can consider all sorts of other information and evidence they find in the record to support their balancing of Whether or not the practical difficulty exists, whether or not there's more weight going to the public interest aspect of what the relief is being requested or the adverse impacts, the detriments to the neighborhood. So I think the practical way I like to think about this is, What this change did is it really raised the ability for someone to seek a variance. However, it didn't take away the discretion of the ZBA. There's no mandate in this statute that they have to grant anything, but it does say that they will have to make certain findings shift their focus a little bit. But in terms of their discretion, they still haven't.

They still put conditions on variances just as they were able to do before. And what I'm going to end on is, I highlighted these two changes with regards to 48 because and I think Amanda did put it really well, which is there are unintended consequences if there's gonna be changes to zoning. Any change in zoning is going to create nonconformities. And now what that means is In certain cases, the zoning amendment is going to create more nonconformities as to, for example, FAR. Now if the FAR is lowered and there are more structures that actually have FAR nonconforming protection, they can expand it by right. also any sort of control that is more restricted on the variance side, now there's an opportunity for that applicant, that building owner to ask for a variance whereas before they would not have been able to meet the bar.

Obviously, every single one of these analyses need to be done on a case-by-case basis, whether it be whatever the proposed zoning amendment is, to look at what those consequences are under the purview and lens of this new changes to 40A. or if it's a specific variance that is being requested. So, that was the main purpose of this presentation so that the Zoning and Planning Committee, as you continue to work are of course aware of it but then have these considerations in your mind when you are discussing any potential change to zoning.

Thank you, Mr. Lee. Now I have a bunch of questions that is mindful committee we've got items that are going to put this whole understanding to the test when we talk about changes to make the zoning informed in use but I mean, try and make sure we get everybody's questions. And we can have Mr. Lee return for another conversation on a specific topic but Councilor Wright and Councilor.

Okay, so question for Mr. Lee. So if we change the FDIR and let's say we lower the FDR just outright then we have all these non-conforming and they can build it If we change the FAR like Lexington for teardowns, so you have an FAR of 0.5, I'm just throwing out numbers and a house is below 0.4 and now you lower the FAR if it tears down, let's say to 0.3. The house as standing is conforming with FAR but if they would rebuild it because it's a tear-down, Large. How does that react to the Section 6?

I don't think that that kind of circumvention of a legally non-conforming protection would be permitted. I understand what you're saying, that technically speaking, that property, that structure is legally conforming until they tear it down But I believe the court would look at when was the ordinance amended and what could that property owner do at that time? versus after it was amended, what it is that they're able to do and afford the property legally non-conforming protections that existed at the time that the ordinance was amended as opposed to when the property was demolished.

So if we made that change before chapters, section six came into law, would it be okay? But now if we do it after- No.

It wouldn't have mattered.

Okay.

but I would just be cautious about getting a firm opinion until we have an opinion opportunity because this is a very difficult issue. I wouldn't want Mr. Lee's comments necessarily beside it as That kind of soon if we ever got into litigation.

Okay, one other real quick thing is so those small lots, small houses on the small lots now wouldn't be desirable because they're over at FAAF?

No, I'm sorry. I don't mean to cut you off but I do want to just build on something that Councilor Baker said which is everyone needs to keep in mind this isn't This is brand new, these changes that have been made. And then with regards to the intent, I can't speak to exactly what the intent was as well as the planning director but it seems clear just from looking at the text changes It's to make construction easier. What type of construction? I don't know how well that was thought out or at least how it applies to Newton, but construction in general easier. So really any attempts to kind of to affect that goal is probably going to run up against an issue because of that amendment to Chapter 48. But any specific... will require additional analysis research to make sure that we've arrived at the right understanding of what those consequences may or may not be from that zoning amendment.

Thank you. I just want to make, I don't want to have an opinion out there that may not apply in a specific case and then we are in trouble. Block, excuse me, Councilor Getz and then Councilor Oliver. I want to get the people in the room and then go to come.

Do you want me to talk now or no?

Wait a minute, I got to get the people.

Okay, I just didn't understand your comment.

Well, I didn't It's a considerate operator error, but let me go to Councilor Jeth.

OK. Attorney Lee, I have some specific questions regarding within here and thank you for sort of even highlighting the fact that the ZBA has discretionary power because that's actually something that I think was really concerning to me, in terms of all of now this new list what can and can't be considered when a variance is in front of them. So I wanted to know, you know, Is practical difficulty legally defined anywhere? I mean, this was a bizarre kind of wording that I'd never heard before.

It's not. I'll share with you that the Mass Municipal Lawyers Association and the listserv has had significant discussion with regards to these changes, The overwhelming opinion is that this standard of practical difficulty is going to be employing land use attorneys for a good bit because no one knows exactly what it means right now.

Okay, all right. Just because it was hard for me to drag anything on it, it was like gone. It was like what does this mean? Okay, and then the other question I had was it sort of pulled into the conversation financial hardship. And I know at the CBA when they're considering 40Bs, they can actually even hire a consultant to go through the process of actually the financial review of a project. Is this something that's gonna be heightened in your mind, in the sense of like is it now going to be yet another sort of caveat that they have to prove The financial hardship at the level, you know within the ZBA?

So it's a may consider. The ZBA does not have to consider it and then also I would-I'd have to defer to the ZDA and how they decide to proceed

All right, all right. And then I just sort of feel as if this is a gate that they need to go through in order to get the variance and wanted to be able to proceed with the issuance of the building permit. So this is actually something that they have to first get the variants

Yes.

Okay, got it.

Thank you. Councilor Oliver I think you had your hand up.

Sorry that just hurt my brain for a second. I guess my question has to do with something that maybe you intentionally didn't go deeper into. And that was the, you had said that they can get a variance for use If I read that one, now you can get a variance for use. And I'm curious if that like what is that? Does that mean someone can come along and say In the middle of some residential neighborhood, I would like a variance to erect some sort of commercial structure, open a business there, plant a flag so to speak and open a business like in the middle of an SR2 neighborhood.

They could have asked for it under the prior version as well, but I think a more likely situation is if you do the inverse of your example. If you have a commercial district where residential isn't allowed and they say they want to build residential there that use isn't allowed there so they can get a variance to allow. So the ZVA can say, well you know what? It's not allowed but we're gonna give you a variance too. Say you can't build a residential use there.

I understand your point. Most of our BU lots have at least some level of residential, so it would probably then depend on like if someone came along and said in a BU2 I want to build a six-story residential building. I don't think we could grant that even by special permit the way it's currently written, do you think so? but that being the case, they now go directly to the ZBA ask for that variance skip the council so-to-speak and request that variance right?

In terms of could they ask that absolutely.

Awesome. I think, again, what I'm taking away if I can Mr. Lee is that the legal authority of the DBA has been expanded to vary The zoning is currently granted by the city. However, the ZBA still has a discretion whether to grant additional variance.

That's absolutely correct.

And And while that additional authority is there and additional considerations can be, should be considered. It doesn't mean that there will be a massive change in the practice We have to wait and see. We're dependent on the members of the DBA making a decision on a case-by-case basis, but that's what I'm understanding from what you said. Is that accurate?

they'll have to make it on a case-by-case basis. We have no indication that there's gonna be a significant departure from their prior analysis on these petitions that they get, of course I think the key is The authority that they do have to grant it is larger. They don't have to use that authority.

That's all. But there's a difference between, you know, authority and action. And that's what you're making a point. All right, now let me go to members of not only committee who raised their hand but anybody in the room that missed. Okay, Councilor Block you're now up.

Thank you. I just wanted to bring everybody's attention which ruled on a variance under the new definition. And if you haven't, I think it was the July ZBA meeting, you may wanna watch that The reason I was watching was because it was in Ward 4, and so I was paying attention to that. And the variance was from Walmart to establish a mini distribution center which is limited by our zoning to 10,000 square feet and they wanted to use a little over 20,000 sq ft. They asked for a zoning variance and it was granted This has nothing to do with housing.

I understand Attorney Lee's point, which I agree with that the main purpose of these changes is encourage more housing to be built. And this may fall under the category of unintended consequence, although I'm not positive about that because Nobody in the legislature is really being that forthcoming with what the intent was behind all of this and that may be a little bit beside the point, but I just bring this to the committee's attention because our are representatives, Schwartz and Sangiolo. And I see Sangiola was on this call so she may know what I'm about to say. They are eager to hear what

Changes to the statute we might recommend to them that would cushion these or eliminate possibly some of these unintended consequences. So yes, we have to live with this now and we can explore what it means. And it will be on a case by case basis but I wouldn't give up on the idea of of developing proposals which our sort of Newton delegation can take back to the legislature and work on. So please do that, I'm not gonna... Not going to mention the content of what I've suggested. It doesn't really matter. I think everybody will have different ideas about how to improve what these changes have led to. So that's it. Thank you.

Kelley. Thank you. Councilor Kelley, welcome chair of land use.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Through you if I may to Mr. Lee as the chair of the committee that Wags the tail of a dog that zap and the state often set in motion. I'm curious, Mr. Lee if you can give us either a broad brush or specific prediction about how the special permit process through the land use committee of the city council will change as a result of these changes at the state level to the variance and the ZBA powers. We're just trying to think ahead about what might change for us on the Land Use Committee.

I don't have a crystal ball. The only thing that would make sense to me, though, is that there would be less requests for Section 6 findings because some of them are allowed by right now. The rest of it, I can't say.

There was no change for Section 9, for example. The 48 which is a special permit section of the general law. But your business may go down a little.

Yeah. Which I don't think we would complain about. I would just like to get a handle on what the nature of that might be We deal in land use, we deal with more with Jonah Temple than Andrew Lee who I have worked with over the years on other things and wonderfully productive ways. and Jonah has said I don't know we need more direction from the state but you were doing this presentation to zap tonight so i thought i would Take the opportunity to see, I'm not asking for a crystal ball at all. Of course, none of us have that but what you might anticipate to be some changes in in the oversight and the voting capacity of the city council as a whole, as a result of this?

I don't think there's going to be any change. You know, like I said, in terms of the number possibly but I couldn't possibly quantify it but in terms of process for a special permit, no change.

Thank you very much. And thank you, Miles for letting me finally co-host it's been frustrating to just be an observer without the ability to raise my hand so I appreciate that you co hosting me thanks

We're grateful for Miles for all things technical. Anyway, all right. Any other questions from Mr. Lee? You're done. Any final words from you? Okay.

The last thing I'd like to say is, of course, I've already said this is novel. This is new. If you have any questions and kind of specific applications that you're thinking about, feel free to reach out the law department.

Thank you very much. Okay, that was just a conversation not an item so we have no vote but I want to thank you again for taking the time and you'll provide your slides The clerk so they can be attached to the report.

Okay, I wouldn't mind just voting no.

However, I will certainly entertain a request for a brief recess so that we can return and take up the last item of the two reappointments. So why don't we take five minutes? Okay.

and a reconvene we'll be back yes recording stopped

Thanks for watching!

Thanks for watching!

I'm mindful that our recording in progress

Oh! We're eight, apparently.

Are you totally moving or just having a little place to sit? No, we're totally moving.

Your place wasn't on the pamphlet, was it? No. No, I can't afford the $20,000.

Sorry.

Is it signed and sealed? What are you going to get? A little part of it that's like not quite Brooklyn and not quite Boston. It's only barely Newton, but it's Newton. So I'm glad you're here.

As I've said before, our city clerk used to refer to it as East Newton.

You know, East Newton, that's where... Are you near the Woven Hill Wizard World?

No, she's south of us.

She doesn't even know a word. Not a human word. Well, I'm about to present it and I was waiting for the interlaker

You want to come join us at the table?

So folks, we have a continuing conversation of item 5726 reconvening

The request for discussion and ordinance amendments to the dimensional controls aligning use in zoning. This is Council of Oliver, Wright, Getz, Roche, Malakie, Kalis requesting discussion to determine alignment of dimensioning controls for residential developments within BU lots with focused consideration were lots in and adjacent to residential neighborhood. You recall that we have had this item before us several times, um, and we had asked the department to go back and try and give us more specificity about specific sites including some photographs which we very much appreciate. However, in the meantime as we just heard from Mr. Lee, the zoning situation has changed so that part of the background that we need to provide the committee is to have the department build on Mr. Lee's presentation to tell us a little bit about what happens if we decide to do what we've been thinking about doing

and where does that take us? So with that, I hope an introduction but correct me if I'm wrong. I'm gonna turn the conversation over to Ms. Wolfe and let her make her presentation.

Okay, so we're just as a reminder, we're talking about residential uses and business districts. We're gonna give a little more background, particularly in relation to these changes that attorney Lee just presented. We're going to revisit the special permit criteria. We're gonna look at some other rezoning considerations and then revisit the parcels that the council has asked us to revisit. So just a reminder of where this started in June, we talked about nonantum and rezoning anything that was beyond two parcels back from Adams Street. That was a residential use but currently zoned commercial. And then we looked at the wider city and then here we are looking at a more specific focus. I'm going to pass it over to Nora, who is on Zoom to talk about the special permit criteria.

Wonderful. Thank you, Amanda. So this will be brief. I know the meat of the presentation is really what Amanda will be speaking to in regard to the potential rezonings. But as the committee requested, we went back and explored different options for adding special permit criteria. and so here you can see in the section regarding residential use in the ground floor this is what The section in the use table refers you to when you're looking to find out that residential use on the ground floor requires a special permit. in the BU districts, and currently it is reserved. So we have come up with this language which the committee could adopt

for granting special permits with explicit findings that the proposed use is appropriate within the context of the neighborhood. from feedback, from the committee that the word context of the neighborhood or the phrase context of The Neighborhood was important. This is the language that we came up with if you go to the next slide So currently there are no specifications for ground floor residential. and the possible addition would require the special permit granting authority to make a finding that the proposed use is appropriate within the context of the neighborhood. and instead of a general consideration for site appropriateness that is currently already baked into the special permit criteria, this would add

explicit consideration of context of the neighborhood. Turning it back to you, Amanda.

Before you go, just to clarify, the site-specific Criteria still remains. It's not being replaced.

Correct. This is not replacing any existing special permit criteria.

Just want to be clear about that, okay? Any comments from members of the committee? Councilor Getz, then Councilor Oliver.

Just remind me, Ms. Cololo did we ever consider massing in the wording here?

Not in the last discussion, I can't recall off the top of my head if the previous language we presented had the word massing but I can go back and look.

Don't think so. I think it said something about the size.

There were some reference to either...

But sides of this, but didn't have the context. So that's why we felt that there ought to be Something about the context. I mean, the size would make the proposed use as appropriate. I guess the question that you're asking is the proposed used as constructed because it's the size right? Is that what you're asking is appropriate?

Yeah, I just wanted that sort of like that piece of it.

It's missing now and it sort of seems as if- The question you are asking is if the use is now residential Correct. That may be perfectly appropriate from the context, but the building may be out of scale in the context.

Correct. It was eliminating what needed to be there.

Okay. So, Councilor Oliver?

I went to Green Room with that comment. The intent here, from my perspective as one of the original docketers of this wasn't converting a B.U. lot in the middle of a residential neighborhood into a residential use, it was allowing that property owner to utilize In a residential use, commercial controls. So it's exactly the math. It's 16 Clinton. Let's stop that was the point. Not don't allow residential use in a residential neighborhood.

It's massive. Let me ask you this, if you said the proposed use and scale is appropriate or something like that, or size.

I mean, I'm trying to get at- Yeah, scale, massing, you know, yes. Because otherwise we're going to end up back in a situation where It's small house, large lot.

I think that the department's defense in a sense they're using proposed use in the context of what is before the special permit granting authority, the land use committee But it's not just the uses because we think about use as business or residential. It's really the use as constructed or proposed is really what you're asking about. And that context would involve something about size, it seems to me, and location as well as the use just to be clear. And I don't know whether that's something we could add in as a committee and just say the proposed use size and location is appropriate within the context of the neighborhood, something like that. Would that do the job? Yeah, but we may not decide that tonight. But just to try and give the guidance to the department, I think it's difficult to do this on the fly.

But Councilor Wright?

Change those BU lots in those residential neighborhoods to, you know, MR, then this wouldn't be a problem. So here they're talking more, so I see this talking more about Adams Street you know which is there and I'm fine with first floor residential but what the problem was was the side streets and being you know BU has an FAR of One or one and a half versus 0.5 for a residential flat?

We're going to get into that, but I think we asked the department to give us both responses. And if we have those situations where a special permit could be granted, and we've been talking about those as relatively rare but they could occur. And if there is no change in the zoning You know, they will be special permit candidates. So I think it's important to have something for that situation and how great or small a number is covered by potentially would be a different question but That's at least, I think something that adds something about scale and location would be an appropriate addition to that language. Okay, but we leave it for the moment. Just give that if that's a sense of the committee, we can leave the department to reflect on it. Okay, so back to you. There's a question. Councilor Albright, sorry.

Thank you. So a question which maybe you're going to get to in a minute, but... Let me ask a question about Clinton and maybe my question will be clear. Are the surrounding houses in this Clinton Street neighborhood, are they all in a BU district?

No, no.

They're not in a MR district?

Yes, most of them are. It's kind of split halfway on the block I would say currently.

So why couldn't we...

I don't think it's EU. If you go to the right, it's MR.

Okay so is it possible to in the special permit process to require them, to require the house that's asking for a special permit to meet whatever zone is primarily the residential area that the other houses represent? You know, if it's MR, then it has to be MR. If it's SR, it has

special permit as a way of getting at that idea. That would be evidence.

Yeah, but you could use in the special permit criteria, you could say that the special Be cognizant of the surrounding neighborhood and what zone it is. So if it's an MR Zone, meet the MR Zone requirements. If it's a SR Zone, Meet the SR Zone requirements give this as strict guidance to the land use committee?

You could do that if the committee was receptive to it, to say within the context of the neighborhood including its zoning.

That's what I'm suggesting that we think about that as well.

I mean, you can just add that as an additional term and I think- That would certainly have helped with the height problem

The one thing that I will note is that, as Andrew just mentioned, a good portion of Newton is non-conforming and so What's on the ground may be smaller than what's allowed. It may be larger and so within the discretion of the special permit to get at the existing kind of massing context of the neighborhood, right? If it's making sure that very large buildings aren't built next to very small homes and using this zoning pathway, it may make more sense to base it off of the existing context of the neighborhood in terms of massing rather than in terms

The potential zoning may be much bigger than the massive. Right? But I think, Councilor, you've heard Councilor Albright's suggestion which i think is just basically trying to get at something similar to what you're saying. The fact that one zone is another, they serve next to each other but your point is important that the zone now may be much more Spacious than the building that occupies it. Okay, all right any more comments on this part? If not I'd like to go to the next part and back to you Ms. Wolfe

I'll take that feedback and confer with law and current planning, and we'll update the language accordingly.

Thank you.

All right, so I just want to preface this section in that they're considerations. They're not intended to push you one way or the other because I think one thing that was notable about our conversation last time was Different counselors have different goals for their district, understandably. So what might matter more in one district like height maybe contextual use is more important to another counselor so we tried to factor that and to the things that we included. So just quickly economic considerations, if you do rezone from commercial to residential it can have an impact on the landowner and the land owner excuse me because it may lower their economic opportunity. However, heavy caveat with that we cannot speculate exact impact on market value so there's no way to put a number to that. Understand Commercial might have more value than residential in some cases.

In other cases, it is reversed. The other thing is impact on the city. So it does eliminate the buy right commercial use which decreases the potential commercial tax base. That being said, we're taxed based on the current use not the zoning. So even if it's zoned business but it's a two-family for example, it would be assessed as residential. So just wanted to touch upon that.

So now, excuse me, you have a question?

Oh no, I was just going to say, you know, I believe most people when they buy their house, they look at the neighborhood and say like this So I never did that and Now that I'm on Zap, I would. But most people wouldn't. You look at the street, you see the street like the street. You think the houses will be all similar so If your lot was zoned BU, most people I don't think would have bought it for that. They'd buy it for the neighborhood and for the house that's on there. Are they losing money? I mean, they're going to sell it hopefully as a house. And one of the things we're trying to stop is overdevelopment because it's a BU lot.

But the only people who might be looking at it is developers, but I think nobody else is actually looking at what's the maximum I can do on that lot.

Carry on.

All right, so now we're going to test you on everything that generally went over. So I want to talk about the relation to variances as we learned from the presentation There is a new variance pathway. Disallowing a use does not mean there's no path for them to have that use. I'm not going to reiterate everything Attorney Lee already went over, but the- that we went over was it doesn't guarantee the variance is granted. So there is this new pathway, we want you to be aware of it but we've yet to see how that plays out.

Again, can you just repeat that again?

Basically it's the use variance. If somebody is zoned business and they say I want to make a residential and you say well wait a minute we don't want that to happen They say, well, I'll go to the ZBA. That's just what we've been talking about. And they can say no.

Right. So I gave a couple examples to put this in perspective. So say a property is rezoned from BU1 to SR2. That means two-family detached is no longer allowed by right or special permit. That property can still apply for a variance to allow the two- family detached.

But a two-family detached is not allowed in BU1 anyways, unless by special permit. It's not allowed by right. because you don't allow first floor residential.

Well, but there's a special permit pathway so it is allowed. So this is saying if you're eliminating the buy right and the special current pathway, the variance gets introduced. That's it that's the key. So similarly, if a property is currently zoned MR1, which does not allow multifamily buy-write or special permit, they can apply for a variance to have multifamily. Again, does not mean it's granted. So in relation to the nonconformities, as we've learned there's now a new by-right pathway for nonconforming properties. To reiterate if a property has been forming due to lot size, frontage, lot coverage or FAR The nonconformity can be expanded by right as long as the proposed changes comply with height, setback and story requirements. So the nonconforming changes do not apply to other dimensional environments and they don't apply to uses.

So we looked at all of the zoning, the current zoning of the parcels were looking at as well as the proposed free zoning and in some cases rezoning may create more non-conformities, and more non conformities can create more flexibility. So in other words The rezoning would have the effect of having larger structures in some cases. We did look at all of the dimensional requirements if a property is conforming after rezoning from BU1 to BU2 It increases the minimum lot area per unit in all cases. Sorry, from BU1 to the residential. and then so that would remain. It establishes a minimum frontage where there previously was none

It establishes a lot coverage maximum where there previously was none, and it decreases the FAR allowance. So in those cases if your goal is massing that is helpful If the property is non-conforming, it exempts the property from lot area per unit. It exempts property from frontage. It excepts the properties from lot coverage and it exempt the property for FAR allowance. So this is a perfect example how in some cases it might help you achieve what you're looking for. In other cases, it might actually work against you.

Or be like we didn't even change that time. Yeah. So at least somewhat.

Let me pause for a second.

You have a question about that?

Limited to the table.

Let's carry on for a bit and then we can come back.

All right, so we wanted to pull an example. To be clear, we cannot do this for every property we're looking at because we have to have the actual dimensions available to us. So We just happen to have a recent special permit of one of the properties under consideration.

Can I just elaborate on that? Yeah. I discussed this with them at great length about what they would require in order to get more granular data here, Really, there's no way to do it without hiring a surveyor because what they're using most of the time are measurements from GIS which are far from accurate. Unless we want to spend hundreds of thousands on surveyors to actually measure property lines for us, it's impossible to get the data except from projects where we actually have solid figures. So I just want to elaborate on that.

Thank you.

We'll also take volunteers if you want to go ahead. Okay, so looking at 55 Colella Road with the proposed rezoning which we'll touch upon later when we get to that neighborhood So as a reminder, in the table that you see right here. The top section, those dimensional standards are not applicable if the property is non-conforming. Those are protected by the 40A changes. The bottom section of that table are the dimensional requirements that do still apply? They're not protected.

Second letter, finish. Okay. Go ahead.

So Looking at its conforming status with the current dimensional requirements of its current zone, it's compliant with FAR. It's nonconforming with lot size. However, it was a pre-existing nonconformity so they did not require a special permit for that particular aspect. It complies with lot area per unit And in the case of its current district, there is no block coverage or frontage requirements. Front setback height and stories they received a special permit to build what they built but they were conforming with your side and rear setbacks Now if you rezone it to the nearest residential district, this is what happens. FAR lot size, lot area per unit, lot coverage all become non-conforming. Frontage is conforming.

Front setback and rear setback also were non-conforming, but side setback height and stories are conforming. As I said the top ones are now protected under the 48 changes The bottom ones still apply. So what that means is by right, they could come back right now if we're sorry, if they were to be rezoned by right they can come back to do an expansion of A little over four feet on your side setback. So that's back here, they could go additional four feet height. They could go up nearly seven feet and add a half story. That is what they'd be able to do by right because what has happened now is your FAR, your lot size, your area per unit and your lot coverage no longer apply because they became non-conforming. Bring on the questions.

All right, down to the right and then we'll go around So let's say though if

This FAR was conforming in the new one. They couldn't expand from the FAR standpoint. We would have to stay in there, what we did. So they can only go beyond what is non-conforming.

correct just any of those four yeah so like frontage for example they're conforming so they if they wanted to change the lot size for whatever reason and decrease it they wouldn't be able to do that by right

Just to reiterate, the thing that's so counterintuitive is that if you're Out of scale, you can become even more out of scale. But if you're within scale, then you've got to play by the rules.

That's a fair summary, yeah. And we just wanted you to be able to visualize it because this is the same conversations we're having on the staff side. We're all figuring this out together. The other thing I'll point out is This section right here, they would be able to extend it out up to that front setback by Wright as well because they're not currently at it. So the special permit, they shrunk the footprint they could come back by Wright if it was rezoned to expand as you see there.

Okay, now Councilor Wright.

Just one more quick question is the facade ratio. How does that work with like the setbacks and the side setbacks, and stuff like that?

So as far as we understand it, facade ratio still applies

So they couldn't go to the full side setbacks then.

Only if the façade were recessed from whatever is considered to be the front façades, right?

Basically, it's a version of the setback.

Yeah.

Okay.

That yellow on the top there and the bottom picture at the top Let's say that's the front, and so you added that yellow. Now you're over the 60% facade ratio. They couldn't do that. That's what I'm hearing.

Correct. I don't know if we actually have the facade ratio for this special permit. I believe it came through land use prior to that regulation being in place. It's A little hard to eyeball. I would guess that is more than 60%. But this is the example that we have, so we wanted to show as clearly as possible the increased numbers.

The storyline, rezoning may produce an irony of more development opportunity than less. And so that's part of the calculus we have to undertake if we want to do the rezoning.

All right, we're gonna move on. Okay, so now we're going to go through the parcels again. We've structured them a little differently this time to hopefully make it a little more straightforward. So I think what would be helpful for us is to hear out of these which you still want to consider and which you want to abandon tonight. Okay, so starting with Newton-Upper Falls and Waban and Ward 5 So the first slide is just showing you photos of the neighborhood. This is by the Boylston Street overpass and the second side is showing you the actual properties up for rezoning This one I did a little extra research because there was some question as to why these two parcels were randomly zoned commercial. And it was from

To put the summary on it, it's from when Boylston Street was level with the ground. There was a gas station where that tiny house is now and the other property actually as far as I can tell was never developed so that is why in its own way it is because up until the 1970s is when it was converted. to talk about the impact. So as you can see in the corner, we did a chart that's just a snippet of the bigger one we showed at the last meeting because we just pulled out what's relevant to this particular area. Don't worry about the chart necessarily. That's there for reference. The table on the top is what we want you to focus on. So if you rezone, this is 926-928 Chestnut Street only because they would be rezoned differently. So this one's split out.

Single and two-family detached would be allowed by right in special permit, the buy right height allowance would increase, and the special permit height allowance with decrease. Multifamily would no longer be a permitted use. Single family attached will be allowed by special permit and the special permit height allowance for decrease

That's being zoned to work. I can't do that.

BU2 to MR1.

Amanda, in MR1 the single family attached has the ability to weave Any of the requirements, dimensional requirements? This is Jane Saniswaso. I'm the chief zoning official. I don't know why my video won't turn on so I apologize.

Jane, can you repeat that for them?

Yes, sir. In MR1 are in MR1 and MR2 for single family attached. All of the dimensional requirements may be waived by special permit. So if the maximum height shown in the table in the ordinance is 36 feet, the petitioner can ask for an increase to whatever is deemed appropriate by the committee.

So this is your words.

It's a plus minus here, you know? It's the plus minus for me right now because I'm living in this other world now in terms of what they can come back and do So I literally, at this moment, I can't make a decision. You know, I'm just like...

I think that if I can make your suggestion, if you're not sure, I think the presumption is not to move it forward. Correct. and Holden. It doesn't mean we can't reconsider at a later time, but if the purpose of all of this is to say are there parcels that are important enough to push through the rezoning process Then we want to pick them out. But if they're not clear, my recommendation is that they not be pushed forward. Is that fair? And we're just relying on the special permit criteria if there's any interest in that. Yeah, Councilor.

I have a question. So the one on the right is from the BU and I'm assuming it's meeting FAR.

We don't have a way of knowing for sure because we would, it was built in 1950.

What you can do is go to Accessory Database and they have the house and the dimensions and all the nooks

That's not necessarily reflective of a recent survey. Essentially with assessor's data, there's always the caveat that It generally gets updated when there's new construction. That's usually the procedure. I don't know Newton's process specifically, but coming from other communities, usually when that building permit comes through they update the numbers and like this was from 1950. So we would never rely on that as an actual number to use for a calculation because it could be significantly inaccurate.

Well, so the FAR form We use like one or one and a half. And the FAR for which that basically would... You could get a rough estimate that just by looking at it, I would say is within the FAR for that house. I mean you don't have to be that accurate um and I mean you can go that I can work with you yeah no thank you look at it Because the thing that I think most of us are worried about is the massing. The massing is FAR. So if it's meeting the FAR in their present zone, then if you rezone it, then we need to meet the FAR.

Right.

So the question is, is it meaning the FAR or the present zone? And so we need to take a look at it and yes you don't have any drawings but I feel comfortable going through the assessor's database and taking that to make that determination, to move things on or not.

So we can certainly do that calculation, but what we're trying to emphasize is it wouldn't be an accurate measurement. There can be, sorry, I'm going to call on you a little bit. There's question of whether we could use the assessor's database to make calculations and I'm trying to give the caveat especially with the property that was last came through at 1950, the accuracy of the data. If it's close, especially with the way our FAR regulations are where it's down to the decimal and the residential, I just would caution against using that.

So it has to be under the FAR in the rezoning too? Okay.

I think what I'm hearing from you is that if I can summarize, that if the property is under FAR now and the dinkerman is not huge leave it alone, basically rather than put it into a non-conforming status and then they could go to any number they want within the lot lines. This is one of those cases where Leaving him alone is more favorable in terms of the scale that could result than making his own change. Right? But you can't make that determination without having at least a sense that the current FAR has not exceeded and you can't be certain of that unless you do a survey. So if the numbers are clearly out of line, in orders of magnitude I think you'd be safe but if it's close then that argues for not making a call to go through re-zoning because you don't want to run into a problem that the survey would reveal.

And in fact, and worse by accident, even though you didn't intend it.

The other complication with just looking at the FAR is we cannot tell setbacks or anything like that so even for example if it is not conforming to FAR as a result The setbacks might be too restrictive as is No point. They can't go bigger anyway.

Yeah, yeah. So doesn't control the massing. It's basically if it's one story and there's a lot of coverage that controls the massin. If it's two stories or more It's the FBA. So because our setbacks are so generous or so little that, yeah. What's controlling the massing is generally for two stories or more as FAR, not the setbacks at all. Setbacks is just where you put it on the lot.

But let's assume you've got stories as well. Aldrich. Councilor Aldrich, a question.

Yes, do I remember what it is? So this is ReZone BU2 to MR1. What does multifamily mean and why is that not allowed?

And MR1, so in BU districts they don't set dimensional regulations based on building type. All buildings and business districts follow the same dimensional regulations Once you get into the different zones, the same thing can be called different things in our zoning. So multifamily and the case of our zoning ordinance refers to three or more units whereas we then separated out single and two family detached as well as single-family attached because like one multi-family becomes a on allowed use, but single family attached is allowed. So you could have three units in more of the townhouse style essentially versus multifamily which has more requirements around way of entrances and things like that.

So single family attached requires a 25 foot setback all around. I can't see that happening on this lot, but you know, I mean, so it's allowed use, but how do you make it happen? Our zoning is not right for that.

This is a good test case of the process. So again, I'm going to call on my Ward 5 colleague. Is this one the parcel that we need to spend more time with?

At this point, I'd say no.

OK. All right. OK, so that's going to be I hope we can cut through these to get to the ones that really are standouts because I think we want to, I'd like to have a successful vote through the council. That's the whole issue but I'm going to make our Clear case to our colleagues if we get there that these are the ones we want to do. Councilor Allen?

Being selfish, you're about to ask me that same question in one part of Ward 1 and I'm looking at Two lots in here, which is great. Thank you. But I don't have these all. Would these be all the lots in, for example, Newton Corner?

These were... So at the last meeting there were some that were removed. The council told us whether or not certain ones wanted to be considered or not and we only moved forward with the ones that either people were unsure, or they definitely wanted to still consider. That was the direction from the committee.

We had done a triage.

Oh, so to be clear, Nonantum was separate because we spent a that was part of my time at New and that was what the June meeting was. So Nonantem is in there. Not in this situation.

This is all the extras.

But we should be doing this for the nonantum ones, too. That's a fair point. Thank you.

I can't vote on Ward 1 if that's what you're about to ask me. Because it's not here. No, we need to make sure.

Let's just get these out of the way and then see what we do about one because that's where all this began.

All right, so same neighborhood but this side of the street we're looking at SR2 Single family detached has a special permit and buy right pathway. It increases the buy right height allowance, it decreases your special permit height allowance. The other styles become disallowed uses.

So this is like an incredibly small lot. This is like a Zippo lot, I mean it's on the corner and so small. You know, I mean, I just would say it's a shed on this property.

Well, again, to me, it just doesn't make sense to shift it to SO2.

All right, then let's leave the loan entirely.

I would just caution that overall, if it's about developability as of now, then 100% correct. if there is a time in the future when, say like a developer buys up multiple lots in this area. You know, in terms of use that's like down the line I know but just it's another consideration for you. I think you're dead on this can't be developed as is This could be a critical piece on the land assembly.

But that's SR2. And this lot is...

2,452.

So I'm going to recommend unless there's a groundswell of opposition for more than five but we go forward without this. All right, let's carry on. I want to see how far we can go.

Okay, same ward. We're now looking at Chestnut Street south of Sullivan Avenue. Again this is just neighborhood snapshots not the buildings you're looking at rezoning This is the one building that was still up for consideration. So it's 7 Hale Street. It would be a rezone from B1 to MR1, Single and two family detached would be allowed by special permit and by right. It increases your by right height allowance. It does not substantially change the special permit height allowance The reason we phrased it like that and you'll see that on other slides is because of the difference between the flat roof height limit and your peaked roof height limit. So what we're saying is it's marginal because like, for example, I don't want to, we won't do this for all of them just for the sake of time, but in MR1 for single and two family detached

You get an increase in 12 feet if you have a sloped roof, six feet. If you have A flat roof that's what that's referring to Multifamily would not be allowed. Single-family attached would be allowed by special permit, and again it does not substantially change the Special Permit Hike Allowance.

Wait, wait, why would this not be because they can if we change it right now. So right now there It's a minutia of change Well, but they could tear it down and build up the whole lot. It's an 1830 house versus if we kept it This is in the district. Then I won't worry.

Okay, we're moving on to West Newton Ward 3. You're off the hook now. So we're looking at the corner of Auburndale Avenue and River Street. This is some neighborhood context, and these are the parcels up for consideration. And so in this case, it would be a rezoning from BU1 to MR2. All of the residential uses would be allowed. The only by-rate pathway would be for single and two family detached The height for single and family Single and two-family detached increases for the buy right pathway, it does not substantially change the special permit allowance. And the changes in height are minor for multifamily and single family attached.

So you're on board.

Yeah, I'm seeing this differently from what the rest of you are doing. So generally, because of BU, I'm taking a look at the houses and just getting a rough idea what it is. And we'll see two to six. it's probably half the lot, maybe 0.45 is the FAR on that one and then BU1 I think the FAR is either 1 or 1.5 So the mansing on this lot, they could go twice as much than what's there.

I mean that's a... This is a bigger This can have a bigger impact because of its scale. It's not just a poster stamp, and it's at a major intersection.

I mean, I feel like I'd like to change it But I would like to sit down and do the math first.

So can we, again, we're not going to decide I think all of this tonight. We're gonna have a package of all of these. I'd like Panto to have a chance. Okay, so let's put this one in the category of possible but not excluded. And then, I'm thinking ahead to the point at some point we're going to have a kind of A final list of these are the ones we want to do. And I'd like to have at least that be a fairly clear list and it'll be a smaller list than all of the categories that we look, I mean, all the candidates. I'm sorry, Councilor Rook? There are studies about academics and professors teachers, and how they're oriented to what is finally running.

And they call on people. Because I so far have not figured it out when I'm on that side.

You're welcome to move over here.

There's no power outlet over there. I'll have to bring my own extension cord. Okay. So I probably should have said this earlier, but this is a good place to talk about it. I don't love our choices here because the assumption is that the BU one is there's something wrong with it because of the by right or special permit ability to build Multifamily, and that somehow other than with the new zoning changes, the MR is more what we want to do. And I think some of these lots like this one or this package

is a good opportunity for the kind of housing that we don't explicitly allow for outside of the VCOD, which is some modest multifamily housing that is not family detached. and that this would be a good opportunity for slightly taller buildings than are allowed in the MR maybe by a floor with some restriction on unit size to allow for more attainable, but this strikes me as really pointing out a gaping hole in our zoning more than then a great opportunity to choose between BU1 and MR2 despite you know not Irrespective of the complexity that changing MR2 creates because of the new zoning changes.

I'd rather leave it alone until we have an option which creates a better multifamily option by right.

Okay, Councilor Wright.

So the idea here is to kind of match the zoning for the neighborhood. Adams Street is a perfect place for what you're proposing. This is all one and two families, except for the dry cleaners. So this is matching the use. And these, except one of them was actually a three-family, the rest are one or two families is matching This whole practice or whatever was about. So yes, I agree it's different and we'll leave Adam Street as the BU but The Clinton Street, now this is a little bit more busy than Clinton Street. but it's all residential except for the one lawn across the street.

But I'm challenging that the initial assumption that it has to match the exact nature and the vacuum strength that it surrounds. What I'm suggesting is that these BU districts are not MR1 or MR2, and then therefore They are good opportunities for some of that gentle density missing middle, which is close to the surrounding but not necessarily similarly constrained. you know, down the block is that the development that I think Simicoe did which is five or six townhouses. That has turned out to be A perfectly fine building in that neighborhood to me. And then it's similar gentle density here rather than Rather than pulling back the development opportunities, let's better define the development opportunity so that it provides more of the kind of help we want.

Hang on, folks. I appreciate the comment but I'm going to exercise the chair's discretion to say that choice for us right now if at some point we change the zoning and these things to something else then I don't disagree. There may be other options.

In the absence of that, then I would say we should just leave it as is.

Okay.

But Councilor Wright has argued for... Yeah, especially that we just rezoned the village centers. We haven't seen it all. There's You know, a couple blocks from there. There's an 18,000 square foot lot.

I'm going to stipulate your arguments. You tell me what you want to do.

Oh, I want to take a quick look at it but my inclination is

to move it to MR. Again, this is a committee collective decision and we ultimately have a chance to revisit these and we'll have a public hearing on anything we propose anyway. So let's just not misunderstand, and there may be other categories for future zoning uses of some sort. I don't mean to minimize the suggestion. I'm just saying that right now we're trying to get us through the gate of some action on something for all the time and effort we've spent.

and I get my energy starting at 10.

Councilor Wright, just because you want to do more of a deep dive, we're happy to meet with you one-on-one about these but I just also want to point out again MR2 as Jane pointed out, waivable. SAR doesn't apply to single family attached. That's the other thing to consider, so...

Okay you guys have another conversation. I just wanted to bring that up. Well pointed out and all these comments are helpful but i want to get us I'm trying to get us out of here by 10 o'clock. If there's any way we can do that, we'll do that.

Continuing in Ward 3, we have the corner of Washington Street and Watertown Street. This is the context. It's right where it transitions to residential. And this is the property that we're looking at, 953 Watertown Street.

Yeah, I think that should get moved.

Okay.

I appreciate the efficiency. All right.

Okay I think the photograph's really been helpful, by the way. I want to thank you, the department for taking the trouble to do that because the neighborhood context plus the actual parcel make a difference in making your decision. Yeah, we were... Credit Councilor Gordon for pointing that out.

Thank you also.

It's really helpful. That feedback is immensely helpful for us so thank you as well. Okay, we're looking at Washington Street still in Ward 3. This is some snapshots of the neighborhood obviously Washington Street is more commercial and then it transitions into residential which you are seeing those first two photos

So this is a little bit like we just recapped, we talked about board one where you step back from the street. How far back do you go from the Street? If this was on Washington Street, we wouldn't be having this conversation but because it's setback 1 Parcel, is it within the zone of protection? Or should it be changed or should it stay? So again. Wright, and Councilor Madigan.

So the 53 across street? Yes. I think that would probably should match The B is zoning. Okay. And then the other one is what, 57? And also because it's across the street from the BU zoning, too. So it kind of matches up there.

No change for that one.

So 49 and 53 Cross Street is the two you're referring to. Here, I can go back. Oh, is it both of them? Yeah. Yeah.

I think so, but what do you think, Jillian? I can't see it very well. Let me actually look at it. I keep trying to find them on the... They're almost a little closer. Yeah. They're like lines drawn to set a parcel. Joe's property owns 49. So the top, so 53 is... Oh, the funny one, all the funny steps.

and 49 is one in. Okay, so... I guess 53 makes more sense to be stay business and 49 makes more since to be residential. Is that what you're thinking?

49 is supposed to get $20 anyways.

Oh, is that the one for the parking lot? Right, yeah, so it's sort of irrelevant.

Yeah, it's moved on, whatever.

My sense is that those two are not going to rise to the level of rezoning? Yeah. Okay, and then what about Delaware?

The corner down there. 57, 57. Parsons. Yeah.

That one I'll get back to you on that one. Because it's across from residential, it's next to residential type things.

It has a greater candidate to me too, but again, we've got to start it out, right?

Yeah, all right. Okay, now we're moving on to Auburndale Ward 4 between Commonwealth Avenue and Auburn Street. Do we want to hold on this one? Randy, are you here? No, he's no longer. Okay, so we can keep that on and then I would suggest if Councilor Wright you're willing to reach out to him.

If there's a conversation he can look at these or your other awards or our other one for Kelley. You know, Cyrus is not here. He may have a point of view because he's a member of the committee.

Oh, it's Cyrus. This was really odd law I'm inclined to keep it as such, because it's behind everything. And I think the owner owns some of the commercial lots too.

So why don't we say the presumption that these will not be changed unless But is it possible, I don't want to put a burden on you, but Councilor Dahmubed's out of the country. But if you could just send an email to the board for counselors.

It's for our director, Just for open meeting law, since it's a DACA item we would need to hear it in the meeting for us to act upon it. We couldn't remove it necessarily.

I am not that intimate with open meeting law, but I could weigh in on that.

That's a fair point. You can have a conversation one person Well, that's not a majority of the committee.

I can reach out and BCC them so they can't respond to each other or confer but they can be directed to the information at hand.

The presumption is it's not going to be unless they speak

I believe the discussion last time was on search and DNA.

And again, if there's not a strong reason to go forward then rather not go to A debate that we don't need to have.

And it's the only one parcel? This is just the one, yeah. It's the one. Okay so moving on towards six and eight which is Newton Center, The Four Corners, and Newton Highlands So we're going to look at the four corners first This is the neighborhood context. It's commercial and then I'm sorry, what street is that? Brentwood Ave really is the cutoff where it becomes residential The discussion was to consider 54, 58-60 Brentwood Ave and 5-7 and 9-11 Carthay Circle for rezoning. In this case, it would be BU2 to SR2. Single family detached would be the only allowed use by right and special permit. It increases the buy-right height allowance. It decreases the special permit height allowance Oh, I'm sorry.

I think we, oh, Carthay Circle will be a different zone. So that'll be the next slide. So we're just looking at what happened for this one.

Well, I know things have changed but Previously, when we discussed this, I would have changed this to being SR2.

Yeah, but I mean, this one looks more presidential to me too.

The whole weaponry is, sorry. There's one business that's cornered out.

This looks a little like Clinton Street in capital to me, for the potential of anything.

Mm-hmm. So it's the presumption.

Yeah, that's the second segregation. So you want to keep this one?

Yeah, change it.

No, but I mean keep it in the game.

Yes.

I'm sorry. Let me be precise. The recommendation would be to change the zoning number. Okay.

Sean Buckley disagrees.

Oh well.

I disagree. But if the threshold is keep it in the game, somebody's saying... This is a perfect example. It's on the edge of a commercial district and there's very little residential that would be affected. It backs up to... That's what I'm telling you.

It was very low. Across the street is all residential and all the way down the other side of the street

I pulled up the use map. It's the light yellow is single family, and the darker yellows multifamily. The red is commercial.

Mostly residential, but it's not commercial?

Now, those two blocks. Yes, across the street, not the entire Carthay Circle, correct?

I'm talking about Carthays Circle. We're talking about Brentwood.

Oh, Brentwood.

They're different reasonings.

On the Brentwood side, the same thing I said earlier which is what it does is it takes the And this is one of the problems with this whole exercise, it takes the notion of a transition to just going straight to the limitations of the MR. So I wouldn't be I'm not in favor really of any of these, but this one doesn't particularly strike me as a good exception.

Right now the choice is do we change it to the to the SR zone. I hear that many of these board of state councilors said yes, right? Okay, so let's carry on. Let's do that.

I agree. And you're not committing at this point. It's just a matter of not going to the next stage.

Okay. Now...

Now we're looking at Carthay Circle, which would be BU2 to MR1. So in this case Single family and two-family detached would have a buy right and special permit pathway. It would increase the buy right height allowance, decrease the special permit height allowance. Multi-family would not be allowed. Single family attached would be by special permit and it would decrease that special permit allowance.

Can I just ask what is there now? What is it, a single family house now

So these were relatively recently redeveloped, I think in the last 15 years at most. Maybe less than that, I forget off the top of my head. But those are the two houses on the bottom.

So are they single family or two-family, or what are they?

Two families.

Worth of trouble? Six.

I would change it.

Okay, sure. I'm going to stipulate that I suspect Councilor Rose would not but for purposes of the committee discussion The nature of the neighborhood is residential. That's what moves me somewhat in that direction.

Well, that whole circle is residential and it's sort of on a different height from the commercial that's on the other side.

Councilor Kalis?

Yeah, but it's residential multifamily.

Yeah. And that's what I would go to, yeah. It would go

No, it would go to MR1.

Yes.

It's on the single family. That's the difference.

Yeah, I mean it's a nice little short little street and they're all similar somewhat similar houses.

This is the map for the BCOD and they were left as residential. So, the ones up there that you're looking at Brentwood? They were MRT

It just makes it hard because when we started this discussion, we were talking about keeping houses that are residential areas seeming residential. Now we're introducing Sean's point which is that he would like those to maybe be triple-deckers were bigger houses. But I think from my point of view, these houses if all the sudden you put commercial use there it would be very strange for that little circle. So I need to speak to that.

Yeah, I think for the moment we can stipulate it. I hope that for the choice is do we leave it the way it is or do we change it? We don't have another zoning category and we're not likely to have one. in the period of time that we had. That doesn't mean there can't be new change and something could be done in the future, but for purposes of this item I would like to just cling to the house that we have Let's see where we go. So I think this one is a candidate for change.

Yeah, and I'm going to be spoken if I sit on that multi-resident.

OK. But the point is that they should not stay business. So in your list of properties to make the shift, at least to go to public hearing, that would be one. Okay? All right. Next one. Oh, excuse me, Councillor Allen. You have a different opinion on this? Sorry.

Question. Councilor Getz just pointed out that the Brentwood lots... Yeah. I've heard of DCOD. No, it was. We didn't put this in.

This was proposed.

Proposed them? Sorry.

Yes.

I'm sorry for wasting your time.

The point here is that it was going to be MRT residential.

but also the lot on the street built too which we're not doing on Walnut Street Road and we're changing that so it's going to be MRT also.

The zoning maps we're showing do show all the possible layers. So if it isn't a VCOD, you will see that. Yeah.

It's all becoming clear to me. Can I just add one quick little point? Which is...

Wait a minute. You can't yet.

Okay.

Now, would you like to be right?

My quick point is that one of the factors we discussed earlier was the risk of this being developed under the BU and given the recent given the recent development, the recent bill changes, the likelihood that this is going to be exploited. Again, we're not really worried about commercial. We're worried about The broader opportunities for residential under BU. So I don't think anybody's concerned that that's going to turn into a Wawa, so the concern is that it's gonna be a larger...

It's gonna become Clinton Street as well. I would change it. I think there's an obligation to protect the residents who live there from something happening that we know can happen.

None of these are imminent in any case. And some have higher risk than others, but anyway for purposes of going forward the argument is legitimate to be made, but I think for our purposes at least to give you guidance.

Keep it on the table. Yeah.

Okay. I think that might be a simpler way to think about it.

Are we keeping it on the table or are we abandoning it?

Okay, that might be a better way to frame this.

Yeah. So on the table, what's under the table? There's no one under the Table. Okay, board eight Oak Hill Park So just a reminder, this is that one block in the middle of a subdivision with there's a large I'm not sure if it's apartment or condos off the top of my head, but there's also some commercial uses connected in that. So that's why showing up as an excuse. We did add 55 Colella Road in this and we're also looking at 18 Hanson, 10 to 12 Hanson and 633 Sawmill Brook Parkway. So the four parcels along there. In this case, it would be a rezoning from BU1 to SR3. Single family detached would be the only allowed use by right and special permit. It would increase the by-right height allowance.

It would not substantially change the special permit height allowance, and we demonstrated early on of potentially what they could do by rights.

Keep it on the table. Yes. Councilor Kalis, board A.

He said twice.

I'm sorry, I just didn't hear what he had to say.

Yes!

Okay.

Good. So these would still go forward, OK? OK. All right.

Now we're going to Newton Corner and Ward 1. So we are looking, this is the neighborhood context. So kind of like what we saw on the other part of Washington Street where it's transitioning into residential. These are the two properties, 21 to 23 Peabody Street and 25 to 27 Peaboy Street. And sorry So this would be a rezoning from BU1 to MR2. All of those residential uses would be allowed in some capacity either by right or special permit. The only substantial change is it slightly increases the by-right height allowance of single family and two family detached. The other changes are minimal.

Just because I need to process everything else we heard tonight, I want to keep them. But I'm inclined to leave them as is. Because the context of this neighborhood, like, I think... Denser Housing here. Makes sense. So keep them on the table, but I'm like, I want to do a little more homework than...

If you decide that on reflection, like Councilor Wright, you know, you're doing your homework on a specific thing in your mind, then that's... It might be one where FAR might be

It might be pushed into a nonconformity status. Yeah.

That might be one of your unintended consequence situations. But for the moment, it's still there.

Can I go back? No, you said yes three times. And I mean yes but if you go back to the Ward 8 one there wasn't a choice for a denser um uh residential option so you had BU1 to SR3 I mean I'm okay there being denser too

So we had, based on the framework of whatever the abutting residential district was. So that's what we kept our scope in. This is kind of an unusual one where you have a large multifamily property there.

It looks like from the zoning that surrounds it, if you did something MR, it would be an MR island. Maybe you want to but I think the The general pattern has been to try and match the neighborhood zoning.

Well, actually if you go up to the pictures there's like a condo complex? Oh no, there.

Yeah, so I guess it doesn't read very well on the screen. This area is mixed use because... Oh, it's way over there. It's a big apartment complex but it has a commercial component therefore it falls under mixed use and that is their parking lot up front. This is a function hall and then are the 100% residential uses over here.

Just as a point of clarification, I believe... I can't remember which councilor mentioned. Oh, I-I believe it was Council President Oliver mentioned Denser housing in reference to Washington Street. And that's because the most likely redevelopment scenario would be multifamily housing utilizing the BU special permit for ground floor residential. If it were to remain BU.

I see.

But how many of those houses have been redeveloped?

Yeah, I didn't always have the most recent, but 10 to 12 Hanson and 55 Palola Road have received special permits in the last, I think it's three or four years. Very recent. 18 Hanson and 633 Sawmill as far as I know are not part of any pending application or anything.

So, I don't know with that there maybe you want to go to MR1? No? Yeah.

But we're back to the island idea.

I mean, for special permit, I'd like to see what the reaction is. I

So we've got to give the department some direction here. Right now, the pattern has been surrounded and they've gone to SR. Do you want to make a recommendation that go to MR?

Yeah.

Amar, because one of them is a two family already or two condos.

What is 55 Coella? It's a huge building. What is it?

This is just jumping in, I need to understand where we are. So questions on

Yeah, sorry. When I raise my hand nobody sees me so I just say things. What is 55 Colella Road?

That was the special permit.

For what? What is it now? Two family. So there's half of them are two family already. Yeah.

So counselor Kalis?

Yes. Yes, what? To MR?

Yeah, I would go MR. I want to hear actually in the public hearing what the reaction is because I think that's more appropriate there. Okay.

For just so we know what to look into, is the goal to make those two families a conforming use? Like allow other two families?

Yeah.

Okay, we might recommend I'd have to this is a Jane question but MR1 might not be your best option. Come up with one that that would become a use.

Okay, that makes sense.

The only thing I would add to this conversation is that this was a mistake in way back when, you know, in terms of they were originally plated as single, you And so this strip right here is a zoning error. And I would suggest to you, and that was a conversation when 55 Cololo was coming up in terms of the original zoning maps. Your option here, I think is to keep it BU in terms residential units on that lot going forward. That would be my recommendation.

Then you could have a mix of BU businesses on there, right? Yeah.

Yeah, keep it on the table and we'll listen. Yeah, you're going to get one as a community.

I think we have to have something to recommend to advertise and go for so This is next to last. We're down to the last few, but I'd like to have the department have some clear guidance on what they're being asked to do. There's some sense that the BU district is not appropriate to maintain. That much I hear from the committee. What I'm hearing is some uncertainty among different members about what's the appropriate change. Yeah, Councilor Gordon?

Kalis, I don't know what the answer is but i would say that the neighborhood there was very upset at what could have been built under the business use. I'm just throwing that out there as when you're thinking this through If it's going to public hearing and sometimes that neighborhood is very involved. So just might be something to factor in when you're thinking about what you want to recommend

Yeah, that's good.

So you want to change it and then the target zone is what on a preliminary basis?

Well, the planning department will go back and determine the right one. But I think it's an MR of some sort.

Okay. All right. Does that give you enough guidance? Yeah. Okay, yeah. All Okay. Now, where are we?

We are done.

Okay now we have still the original whole Adam Street sector that's part of this. And I'm not sure we resolve the rezoning questions of those streets because we have not had, you know, the change in the state laws occurred And the only question is, do we adjust anything that we did there as a result of them? We haven't had that conversation yet.

It's my problem but I haven't seen any yet.

Yeah, well that's so I think realistically we can't if we're doing this as a unit. We can't go to public hearing yet until we have some clarification, I think on that item. So what occurs to me is that between now and the next time we take this up whether we do it immediately maybe too soon but at the next all of the candidate properties, including award one and see if we can narrow down where we are for purposes of going to advertising for public here. Does that make sense?

Yeah.

So we would have one more working session in effect on this before we go advertise. Because I'd like to have all the pieces lined up if we can in advance of that. Recognizing issues like Councilor Kalis' neighborhood may change as a result of a public hearing, but at least for purposes of the committee's conversation, I'd like to have a relatively clear set Whereas the committee were supportive of these modifications and including the Ward 1, but we need to have the same kind of conversation now about the Ward one properties that you just had. with these others because of the change in the state law that all occurred in the meantime. So does that give you enough guidance?

Yeah, what I would suggest is we front load the presentation with Nonandum and revisiting Oak Hill since there's a question of whether it should be a different district than what we put up there as well as the special permit criteria adjusted again to reflect and then we can put all the other parcels after that, that way The ones that require a little more decision, we can give a little bit more time.

That sounds like an excellent suggestion. Okay. Any comments from committee or others about that process? If not, I would entertain a motion to hold. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Abstention? Alright thank you for being so patient with this and And I want to commend the department, this is granular. We talked about things that are granular a little. This is very fine grained work and the kind of analysis that you did about what happens if you change the rules of what you can do and what you cant do, and what the effect of the state law. Each of these took some time to sort through so big chair department or whatever it is Echolade of the Day should lead. All right? So we'll take about, I hope 37 minutes.

We have two reappointments to the Conservation Commission. First is two, no, three. Thank you, Councilor Roche for your comment. 268-26, appointing Jeffrey Zabel 269.26, reappointment of Susan Lunum through 70.26 reappointing of Kathleen Cade and I would entertain a motion on all those. So moved. All those in favor say aye. We want to thank Dr. Kalis for sticking it out to the very end, even virtually. This is just, you know. And we're, I'm sorry, we're 15 minutes past my target, but I think we're ready to move adjournment. Anybody want to talk about anything else?

All right.

Motion to adjourn.

There we go.

All right. Okay, bye.

Thank you. I'll move adjournment. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Vote to do. We're done. Thank You very much.

So what stream are you on? uh brian road recording stopped it's really like maybe two blocks south