Somerville Planning Board 02-19-2026

Good evening, everybody. It is 6.04 p.m. on the 19th of February, 2026. It's a regularly scheduled meeting of the Somerville Planning Board. I am Mike Capuano. I am the chairman of the planning board. With me tonight is our vice chair Amelia Aboff, our clerk Jahan Habib, our members Lynn Richards, and our brand new Alternate Member Coralie Cooper who gets to join us for the very first time tonight for a thrilling meeting. Pursuant to Chapter 2 of the Acts of 2025, this meeting of the Planning Board is being conducted via remote participation. A video recording of the proceedings will be available on Citi's website or by emailing planningboard at somervillema.gov. This meeting is being recorded.

We don't have any cases per se on the agenda tonight, but we have some administrative matters and presentation by Alvaro on Chapter 40B. So the first thing I'd like to do is look at the draft meeting minutes of January 15, 2026. Does anybody have any suggested revisions to the draft meeting minutes? Seeing none, the chair moves to adopt the draft meeting minutes of January 15, 2026 as the minutes of the planning board seconded by Emilia. Alvaro, can you call the roll? If I'm Habib? Aye. Lynn Richards?

Hi.

Amelia Aboff.

Hi.

Michael Capuano. Hi. We have meeting minutes. The next is 44 White Street. We voted on, this was an application that came before the board a number of times or was heard by us and discussed a number of times. That application had... Three requests for relief as part of their application. One was a special permit for use. One was a special permit for parking relief. and one with a site plan approval to build a three-story building in an MR4 district. What happened a few weeks ago was, I think, a bit surprising to the members of the board here, myself included. The site plan approval for parking The special permit for parking passed 4-1.

The special permit for the use, I believe, was unanimous. and then there was an interesting vote on the site plan approval wherein I tallied and Alvaro confirmed the tally of three yes votes and two no votes, which means that under the rules and statutes of Massachusetts that that vote failed. It came to our attention that that vote was mistallied for the site plan approval. and that there was a vote that was tallied as a no that should have been tallied as a yes so I believe that vote was was Amelia so I'm gonna welcome her to Say whatever you'd like.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the opportunity for the correction. It was my intention to vote in the positive on the site plan approval. I think I had gone to say yay, but my Audio was cut off at the beginning of the syllable, and that was tallied as a nay vote, so I do apologize for the confusion, but can confirm that it was fully my intention to vote in the affirmative on the side plan.

Thank you. That's a ministerial correction, and I appreciate you kind of coming to my attention and saying the vote was mistallied. I do want to remind people about the difference between special permits and site plan approvals. and the standards that are necessary in evaluating both of those. Special permits are very discretionary. We have a lot of latitude in being able to approve, modify, Deny special permits because they are not allowed under the rules. They are special permits. They are asking special permission. Site plan approval under Massachusetts law is a very different thing. It only requires a majority vote. And effectively, without getting too deep into the weeds, I would, if necessary, we can get a formal legal opinion from our law department. But effectively...

The only way that we can deny a site plan approval is if the application is not complete or if the requests made in the application are So intransigent that no reasonable conditions can be imposed to mitigate them. There was no finding by the planning staff that that was the case. There was no discussion by members of the planning board that that was the case. And a failed vote on site plan approval for this particular application likely would have exposed this board to litigation by the applicant and I'd go so far to say we'd likely lose on that. So if somebody has an issue with an application, The appropriate way to voice that opposition is to render your vote with a discretionary permit unless

The non-discretionary permit, like I said, is going to be so intransigent and intractable that it can't be remedied by a reasonable condition. And that was... nowhere in the record for this particular case. One other thing on this particular vote I don't expect people to vote the way I vote. But as the chair, I do have somewhat of a responsibility to have an idea of where the vote is going to be. Just so I can have an idea of is it meritorious to continue working with the applicant to see if we can get to a place where the board can be supportive if the board is otherwise not supportive. And if they can't, they can't. Denied special permits before and I'm sure we'll do it again. But to the extent that

It was my understanding that there was not a concern on this particular application to then see that there was a failed site plan approval vote or what I thought was a site plan approval denial was concerning. So to... benefit the board going forward so we can fairly evaluate where we stand as colleagues and a board and where an applicant stands as it relates to the progress of their application. I really would hate to see that again. I think that kind of took people by surprise and not in a great way. I think what we've got, I see Lynn's hand. Alvaro, have we corrected the record?

Yes, thank you, Amelia, for correcting that, and that we'll move forward with the decision as the appointment.

Thank you.

Thanks. Yeah, Lynn.

Michael, procedural question. For you in that we spent a lot on 44 White Street. We spent a lot of time talking about the parking. But to my recollection, and I didn't go back and review, I think. I think that first came on almost in September, 44 White Street. All of the prior... Conver, all the prior meetings. But to my recollection, we never discussed the other use permit changes in the site plan. It was almost focused our conversation solely on the parking. and we never talked more broadly about the different aspects of the site plan or the use. And so my procedural question to you is,

If as a board member, I don't know how to say this, I feel you're calling the vote too early because I feel there could be more discussion on the other two points. can we bring that up or how should that be how should that be raised because if I was in your shoes I would and you generally run meetings of kind of getting a sense of what people are thinking but in this case we didn't talk about those other two issues so I was a little surprised that we had a vote and I didn't know how to convey to you that I think we needed more conversation so procedurally what could we have done?

The way I try to do it, and I think you've seen how I run meetings, is I try to get a sense of, yeah, obviously the parking issue on this particular application was... was the issue that was going to be kind of most contentious. Everybody knew that. The applicant knew that going in. I generally open it up, and I think I did in this circumstance too. We can, you know, review the... Yeah, the minutes as needed. Thank you for watching. This particular use special permit, you know, clearly nobody had a problem with it. It's housing. But in other circumstances, we've had use special permits where people did have a concern.

You know, is this the appropriate use for a site in the middle of Davis Square, right? Another weed store, that type of thing. Whenever there is discussion to be had on an application, I don't limit it to, or I don't think I limit it, to specific aspects of the application, the specific votes and things. Avenues of relief that an applicant is having. So if there's a concern that someone has about something that might not have just been raised, raise it. It kind of becomes open discussion by the members of the board. Not just necessarily following the track of where the questions and discussion has gone.

That's really good to know because I had been wanting to discuss the overall site plan for several meetings and I kept looking for an opportunity and I Now I understand that it'd be like, hey, can we talk a little bit about the site plan XYZ? And if you feel we... aren't at a point to move off of whatever topic you can say that but then now you've got the information to bring it back at another point in time. Thank you for that clarification.

Yep, of course. Does anybody else have anything they would like to discuss on the clarification of White Street? The only other item on this agenda is a presentation on Chapter 40B. Now I've been on the planning board. For a while, 2008, I think there has only been, in my memory, one other 4DB project that has come to the city. I might be off on that, but I think the only one that was a 4DB project was the Winter Hill Star Market.

and I don't remember anything else before that and so I was hoping that Alvaro could give an overview because there is another application that is it's my understanding that application is not yet complete but it will be coming to the to the city to the ZBA and in certain circumstances our board at some time in the future. I was hoping that, and I was thinking it was going to be beneficial to the board to have a presentation on what this is because it's not something that we see very often. And so I have I'm certainly not an expert. Alvaro is our planning staff liaison and is. So I was hoping we might be able to benefit from an overview.

and I know there are members of the public here who also I'm sure are interested in viewing this application or viewing this presentation. and I'm not going to open it up to members of the public because this isn't a public meeting this is just a presentation by by city staff and there will be many many many other opportunities in the future for Members of the public to get involved when the process is actually ready to begin engagement. So members of the board, because we will have a Likely responsibility or part responsibility in this process. Please feel free to ask questions as you see necessary.

Can everybody see my screen before the presentation? Correct.

Okay. Thank you. So I'll just go over and try to be... as helpful as possible just to give the overview of the 4EB process and then I have one slide specifically to what the role of the planning board will be. I think sometimes the key of the 4EB is to understand the timeline exactly because with all the small procedures that it has, it can be a little confusing. So just to kind of start us off, the 4EB is a permitting mechanism that developers use to develop housing. This requires what is called a project eligibility letter, and that's something that happens through going to one of four state agencies. So Mass Housing, MHP, DHTD, or Mass Development, any of them can issue a project eligibility letter.

and so in many cases the in all cases the developer will have to present a project to them and that's kind of like where this project or like this process will start so Once they submit the application for the project eligibility letter, The agency that is reviewing this application will have to make sure that all the materials are complete and that's when the clock itself will start. which is where they provide all of these plans and all the information that they provided to the community to the CBA and to the local boards to provide comments back to the agency and that's where they will have up to 30 days for them to make a decision if the developer Thank you for joining us.

application was not complete so the state agencies looking and working with the developer gave them an opportunity to provide the rest of the information so once they finalize that and they make sure that application is complete they will let us know and provide us with the materials and then we as staff we can provide it to our different boards so you can provide comments and send it back to the agency. um so after these 30 statutory 30-day comment period goes by that's when the state Agency can make the decision and then they can provide the project eligibility letter for the developer to move forward in front of the CVA. So the CBA, of course, is the board in this case for the cities that will be looking and permitting these projects. No developer can move forward to apply with the CVA if they don't have a project eligibility letter.

So once the application has been filed with the CVA, the CVA has seven days to distribute all of the materials that they have received to the different boards to receive comment prior to open a public hearing. in this case of course the planning board will be an advisory will be participating as an advisory board providing comments to the CBA and in many cases that's where in many communities this is where the planning board will be looking at the waivers that the application is applying for um what zoning are they looking to bypass, what is the connection with the master plan that Somerville has in place. So all of those comments can be provided to the CBA so they can look at that information once they're opening the public hearing. as usually the public hearings from the CBA will be looking at a specific topic at each of those meetings.

So like I said, within 30 days from the CPA filing to the CBA, they must open the public hearing. Once the CBA has opened the public hearing, there's... There's 15 days where they can claim what is called Safe Harbor. And Safe Harbor is the mechanism that communities have to... that they have met the legislation in regards to affordable housing so they are not impose a 4EB and they can either deny it if that was the case or they can work with the applicant to impose a series of restrictions so the project will meet more the zoning and the master plan of the community. There are two ways to meet Safe Harbor. One of them is the SHI percentage.

This is the subsidized housing inventory and that's when communities have over 10% of their affordable housing stock so if you kind of like take account all the housing that exists in Somerville and then you look at all the affordable housing as a numerator over the denominator you kind of like get the percentage and then you'll see what is the percentage of affordable housing that Somerville has so now the numbers that EOHLC has provided us are updated on September of 2025 and they provide us that we're at 8.93 of SHI. The other form that A community can claim safe libraries to CLAM, what is called the General Land Area Minimum, and that's when a community has over 1.5% of its total land.

as subsidized housing. So in 2002, the city of Somerville calculated that we had 3.8 of GLAM occupying SHI units. These can be recalculated, but the only moment that AOHLC can provide an update on this number is when there's a determination for a 40B. As because of there is restrictions of confidentiality when it comes down to affordable housing. So that's why they are not able to give this data or make this data public in an advisory, but just in the case that A CBA is trying to claim safe harbor and is because there is a 40B coming or in front of the CBA. Also feel free to raise your hand if you have any questions as I'm explaining.

Can I ask a quick question? So it's unclear to me, given what you just said around the glam. whether or not Somerville can claim it. It can claim safe harbor. It appears as though they can because they meet one of the criteria. But is that definitive or is that just... Intended.

So at this moment, it's intended. Of course, it depends. It's up to the CBA deciding they would like to claim Sink Harbor. But because numbers do change, housing stock changes all the time. You cannot base the answer on the numbers that we're looking at the SHI of September of 2025. And because this is looking at restricted information because it's affordable housing. The CBA will have to claim safe harbor and let EOHLC know. which is the executive office of Living Communities and Housing of Massachusetts that they plan to claim safe harbor, provide all the data that they have, and then they will look at the information and say yes or no you do meet safe harbor based on GLAM. Last time that this was calculated this was on 2022 and at that point Somerville did meet GLAM.

So we won't know if Somerville will claim. So two things. We don't know if Somerville the city will claim safe harbor um until we get to this part of the process and then number two we won't know um if they're eligible to claim it until we get to that point in the process

Correct.

All right. Thank you.

Yeah. Hurley.

Yeah, thank you. On the previous slide, you had two terms, the SHI subsidized housing and then

Okay, thank you.

Alvaro, I'm trying to remember back in 2022. Amelia was on the board. Jahan, were you on the board as well in 2020? I think so. I thought so.

Yes, I was, Mr. Chair.

I thought so. I thought so. I have no recollection of... What happened the last time Somerville had a 40B application and that would have been at the Winter Hill stock market? I remember that We had had discussions offline with the proposed developer about phasing and going through the planning process, and then they elected not to go through the planning process and instead decided to go the 40B route. I don't remember, I don't even think I know what the city's position was on Safe Harbor at the time. And I don't remember that at the time I was still the chairman of the planning board. that the planning board received any information from the ZBA following that.

you know it's a number of years ago so my my memory might be a little foggy but I'm wondering one if you can answer the question about what we did in 2022 and if Amelia and Jahan who were still on the board in 2022 with me might have any clearer recollection on what happened during that time period than I do right now.

I thought I remembered during that process that there was an extended negotiation and back and forth between the developer and the ZBA at the conclusion of which they were making the decision. on whether or not to claim safe harbor. And I know that's not the question you were asking, Michael, but I'm having a hard time reconciling my understanding of the process of that at that time with what's being described here. Alvaro, I don't mean to be asking you questions on history from before you were here.

No, no worries. I was looking at the decision. And so to my understanding, that was a friendly 40B. So the city did not claim safe harbor to... Stop, let's say, or deny the 4EB because they work on tandem with the developer to... Decide on the project, the final project. So the decision and the hearings were following before you be process but there was no intention to deny because they were working together as a friendly 4EB rather than like an unfriendly 4EB or something like you know like in the case that When they don't try to work with the city to apply for it, then in those cases that's when CBAs usually trigger safe harbor because they don't have a clear understanding of what the project will be looking at or if there will be any sort of assistance or potential work with the developer.

I think that answers kind of my second question as to what the city did. My first question was, what did the ZBA do relative to its involvement with the planning board once that process kicked off? Because I do not remember any... Full engagement by the ZBA with the planning board once that process began.

That I don't have information. Also, from reading the records, I didn't find any information related to that.

I would expect that that would be the case this time. Anybody else? Okay. Thanks. Avara, you can keep going.

Yep. So... Kind of looking at the period, if there were a case where the CVA claims safe harbor, there will be 15 days for the developer to appeal to Mass Housing and the CVA. And so within 30 days, Mass Housing must issue a decision explaining if the city does meet Safe Harbor or not. So this will come down if one were to appeal. If that decision was to appeal... The public hearing must still open in this period because the clerk technically will still take in from the moment that the hearing was opened by the CBA. Then once they review the application and they decided to claim safe harbor.

And so similar to other mechanisms of permitting, there's a time limit of 180 days. from the opening of the CVA of the hearing for it to close unless there is an extension agreed among the developer and the CVA And so within 40 days from the close of the public hearing or extended as the developer and the CBA agree, the CBA must come down to a decision and it has to be filed with the city clerk. And within 20 days of that, there's the typical appeal period where anybody can appeal to the decision. And so... If there's no appeals after those 20 days and the comprehensive permit has been approved, then the developer will have to go back to the state agency, in this case Mass Housing, and will have to present the final approved application and

Move forward with what will be the building permits, construction permits, etc. They just have to make sure that they meet all the standards and requirements as they follow and the restrictions imposed in the 40B, if any, and in the case that there was safe harbor.

Can I ask you to go back one slide? Mm-hmm. So, yep, that one. So if a comprehensive permit is approved and no appeal is filed within the deadline, who has standing to bring an appeal? Who has the option? Who has standing in the ability to appeal?

To my understanding, it could be...

If you want, I'm happy to kick this back over to the law department. Just because I think... I'd be interested as a board member as well as a resident of the city. And I'm sure there are people in the audience who...

I'm happy to just hold it back because I'm not as clear. Thank you. So yes, so this will be the point of construction once all the architectural engineering plans will be at the building permit level so they will be filing with the inspectional service for the revision. And so for the planning board involvement, coming back to the 30-day comment period where we started, once the materials have been given to the city and they can be provided to the boards to provide comment, The planning board can provide comments on site design, infrastructure, community impact, and the consistency with the master plan.

As mentioned before, the applicant must provide the list of waivers that they're looking to apply for and bypass from the local zoning. You can also provide comments to that and through my experience all these letters are helpful to just provide to the CBA prior. In both cases, right? Like when you're providing it to the agency with all the comments you would like to see as they take this in consideration to make the decision of providing the project eligibility letter and the same form for the CBA once they're opening the public hearing. Once that information is provided, we can have it in the public agenda and provide any comments. And then me as a staff, I'm happy to take any comments from the planning board members and just kind of like consolidate it and bring it back. So we can review it before sending it either to the state agency of the CBA or whichever state that happens.

Can I ask a quick question? Go back one slide. It says here consistency with Summer Vision 2040. Do we have an updated Davis Square plan?

Not at the moment.

So the only consistency that we are looking for is alignment with Summer Vision, not any neighborhood plan? Correct. Okay.

Can I ask, I think if I can bring it up, that's right where I was going. We don't have an approved Davis Square neighborhood plan, but we do have the approved Davis Square commercial area plan. Which covers this geography, even though it is a different plan type than a full neighborhood plan, I believe. With that, this might be a question for Mike or might be a question for Alvaro. Would that be considered the sort of guiding neighborhood plan document at this stage?

Not going to answer that question quite yet. I think we need some additional guidance.

Yeah, I agree. I don't know if there will be some difference between a neighborhood plan and a commercial one because this one is focusing Only on housing. So I'm happy to bring that question back and double check.

I don't think it's focused only on housing. I think it's at the minimum of mixed use because it has first floor retail.

There's a lot in that plan, as I recall, about the urban form of Davis Square and the reorganization of the street grid and sort of the broader Urban Experience of the Square. There was a lot in it about streets and sidewalks and pedestrian mobility. I haven't looked at it in some time, but as I recall.

Mm-hmm.

I think before we get too far in the process we should get some clarity in that since it will be a Short period of time and that feels like appropriate homework for planning board members is to review if there is a neighborhood or commercial plan that will that any proposal will have to be aligned with for us to have reviewed that ahead of time. Again, since it's such a short comment period, I believe.

I'm happy to look into it and distribute it. Thank you. So yeah, that's the gist of the 4EB process itself, the timeline and what will be the areas and topics that The planning board will be looking at and sort of making comments within those two main time periods. That being said, once the public hearing is open and the CBA is following the process of the 4EB, the planning board members can Look into the hearings and can provide any other comments either as a planning board or as a regular citizen. They can provide any of those comments at any point during the public hearing.

Yep, I'm good.

I think I'm understanding from this that the planning board will not be taking testimony on this at any point, but that public testimony will go strictly through the ZBA process. that the planning board's recommendations are coming out of internal planning board discussion, of course, in a public forum. Is that correct?

Yes.

Thank you.

Thanks very much for this. This is helpful, certainly for me, because we haven't gone through this process in quite a long time. And I'm not sure the process in 2022 mirrored what this reflects. So I think this was certainly beneficial for me and for other members of the board and I hope that it at least gave the members of the public who joined us tonight some insight into what to expect going forward with this application. The engagement that they can have, the rights that they will have, and the involvement that the planning board will have too. I don't think then... If there's anything left on the planning board's agenda. Our next meeting is March 5th. Does that sound right? Yes.

Right now you think that there will be A case that will be here.

Yes, there was one case advertised for that meeting. Great.

So, nothing else on the agenda of the planning board. Mr.

Chair, could I request the addition potentially of an item of other business for the next meeting to discuss Ways in which the city's sustainability goals and the form-based code may need to be reconciled as just sort of an open discussion topic, if it pleases the chair.

Yeah, of course. Especially since I think next agenda will be fairly light, I don't think that's going to really impact the flow of the evening. And Alvaro, do you think that there is an appropriate member of... City staff who can be present to engage in that discussion with us yeah i'm happy to reach out to the sustainability office to see if anybody's available Nothing else. At 6.42, we did great. At 6.42 p.m., the chair moves to adjourn, seconded by Amelia Alvaro. Can we have a roll call, please?

Jahan Habib. Aye. Lynn Richards.

Aye.

Amelia Aboff. Aye. Michael Capuano. Aye.

Crowley Cooper.

Aye.

Congratulations on your first vote.

Thank you.

Thank you everybody. See you in a few weeks.

Thank you.