The Zoning Board of Appeals voted 4-1 on Thursday night to overrule a previous finding that a proposed McLean Hospital residential facility is a permitted use of the property under state law.
McLean bought adjoining parcels at 16 and 22 Bypass Road last spring with the intention of putting 12 beds for boys age 15-21 in the large home on one of the properties. The goal was to have boys with borderline personality disorder live there for several months while receiving dialectical behavioral therapy to help them learn to function better.
Lincoln zoning bylaws prohibit uses other than residential in that area, but McLean claimed an exemption under the Dover amendment, which allows religious and educational facilities in residential areas. Building Inspector Dan Walsh and town counsel Joel Bard agreed with the hospital’s claim that the proposal constituted an educational use. But a group of neighborhood residents appealed to the ZBA, which sided with the residents after a hearing that featured much debate over whether the proposed facility was primarily educational or medical/therapeutic.
“I’m certainly a fan of the notion that you don’t have to have traditional classrooms to have it be educational, and I’m favorably inclined to the idea that education is rolled into therapy, but the Dover amendment is not written in a way to say that education is therapy and therapy is education. This is closer to therapy than education,” said ZBA member Bill Churchill.
“The primary end goal is treatment. The curative aspect is the goal here,” said ZBA member David Henken.
“I do think this is treatment. There’s obviously some education involved, but I don’t think it’s the primary purpose,” agreed board member David Summer.
“I don’t think this is an educational purpose that is the intent of the Dover amendment,” ZBA chair Joel Freedman said.
Board member Eric Snyder said he would vote “based on what he read from various doctors” on both sides of the issue. He ultimately cast the lone dissenting vote.
Freedman had a word of caution for those against the proposal, however. “The idea that Dover amendment is something that has come in and usurped local zoning is something I disagree with very much,” he said. “It’s a good thing when a community like Lincoln has to participate in things… that may be distasteful or may not be what they want. There’s no credence to the idea that there needs to be protection here.”
The ZBA achieved the minimum of four votes that are required to overturn the building inspector’s finding. Board member Kathleen Shepard was not at Thursday’s meeting and Vinit Patel recused himself from the vote.
McLean officials declined to comment after the meeting.