The Zoning Board of Appeals will take up the issue of McLean Hospital’s proposed Bypass Road property use at a public hearing on Tuesday, Sept. 29 at 7:30 p.m. in Town Hall.
A group of 10 families who live in the neighborhood of 16-22 Bypass Road filed an appeal challenging the determination by Building Inspector Daniel Walsh that McLean Hospital’s proposal for a 12-bed facility on Bypass Road constitutes an educational use of the property. Educational and religious organizations are exempt from certain residential zoning restrictions according to a state law known as the Dover Amendment.
In a July 8 letter, Walsh noted that McLean’s proposed use has “multiple objectives which include residential along with therapeutic and educational functions” and agreed with an earlier opinion by town counsel Joel Bard that the use qualifies for the zoning exemption.
The Planning Board voted 4-0 on September 13 to approve McLean’s site plan, which concerns only issues such as parking and visual screening on the property.
Neighbors have argued that there is a safety risk from the proposed facility, which will offer dialectical behavioral therapy as part of a psychoeducational program to young men aged 15-21 who will live there for periods of weeks to months. In an interview with the Lincoln Squirrel last month, the director of McLean’s Psychology Department refuted the notion that the young men posed any danger.
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