Officials scrambled before Town Meeting as HCA amendment took shape

The Housing Choice Act rezoning measure passed by a thin margin last month — but not until after the last-minute introduction of an amendment (ultimately approved) that blindsided many at the March 23 Town Meeting. Town officials say there was not a coordinated behind-the-scenes plan to spring the amendment on residents. But their recollections reveal a rushed series of actions and decisions demonstrating that detailed procedures for Town Meeting should be clearly agreed on and publicized in advance — something the Select Board and Town Moderator have promised to do with public input this spring.

In the weeks leading up to Town Meeting, Lincoln Residents for Housing Alternatives spearheaded a push to vote “no for now” on Article 3. The group wanted more time to collaborate with officials on an alterative plan that would have reduced housing density in the mall subdistrict. Meanwhile, several residents, including but apparently not limited to Planning Board members Lynn DeLisi and Ephraim Flint (who had earlier voted against endorsing the plan), were preparing to submit an amendment on the floor of Town Meeting that aimed to achieve the same goal.

Michelle Barnes, chair of the board of the Rural Land Foundation, which owns the mall, was actually the one to propose the amendment — even though she and the RLF executive director Geoff McGean were taken by surprise  when they learned that an amendment of some sort was coming just nine days before Town Meeting. (Both are also members of the Housing Choice Act Working Group, which headed the process of writing new bylaw language.) DeLisi herself was also apparently surprised by Barnes’s move at Town Meeting.

The original draft approved by the Planning Board called for 20 units per acre in the mall subdistrict. The amendment passed at Town Meeting reduced that to 15 units per acre while also increasing the maximum density of the Lincoln Woods subdistrict from eight to 10 units per acre, and the Lincoln Road/Lewis Street subdistrict from 11 to 12. The amendment also struck language that would have given the Planning Board leeway under certain strict conditions to reduce the required percentage of commercial use at the mall from the required 33 percent.

Who knew what and when?

“There seems to be an effort to put a single timeline together that specifies when everyone decided on amendments and that everyone knew what everyone else was doing. This is not the case,” Director of Planning and Land Use Paula Vaughn-Mackenzie told the Lincoln Squirrel on March 26. “There were several people who were thinking about an amendment, not one initiative. There was not one timeline. It was different parties making their own decisions on their own timelines. Nonetheless, here is an incomplete sequence of events:

Sometime before March 14: Town officials learn that an amendment to the zoning bylaw was probably going to be proposed on the floor of Town Meeting. “I recall that I heard that there were several people thinking about an amendment,” Town Moderator Sarah Cannon Holden told the Squirrel on April 1. “I have no idea when I heard that the RLF had an amendment. It seems to me it was just one of many.”

Timing unclear: Planning Board Chair Margaret Olson asks Vaughn-Mackenzie to draft a 15 units/acre amendment and have planning consultant Utile to review it. Utile reportedly tells them that it would meet the state’s HCA guidelines.

“Margaret had mentioned at public meetings that she thought it would be a good idea to have a couple of possible options vetted with Utile before Town Meeting in case an amendment was made,” Vaughn-MacKenzie said on March 26.

“The amendments were prepared at my request because I had heard from some citizens that they were considering making a density amendment on the floor of Town Meeting. I did not want Utile (who was present at Town Meeting) to try to validate a density amendment on the fly,” Olson wrote on LincolnTalk on March 24. “The slide with the density chart was prepared so that Town Meeting could assess the changes. The RLF (and several others) asked for the text of the 15 units/acre amendment.”

March 14 (morning): Vaughn-Mackenzie tells the Housing Choice Act Working Group that an amendment is expected. The group initially assumes that the Planning Board will discuss it at its scheduled March 19 meeting, as McGean notes that not having any public input from the Planning Board “puts RLF in a really difficult position.” 

Vaughn-MacKenzie initially says that the board could have that discussion because its March 19 agenda had not yet been posted, although the town calendar web page indicates it was in fact posted on February 27. Later in the meeting, she acknowledges the concerns about whether the board should discuss it before Town Meeting and said she would convey HCAWG’s recommendation that it not do so.

March 14 (evening): At the final HCAWG preview of Article 3, residents continue to express concern about housing density and commercial occupancy at the mall and float the idea of proposing an amendment at Town Meeting. Olson says that an amendment cannot change the boundaries of the subdistricts or add or subtract subdistricts or parcels or it risks not meeting state HCA guidelines.

“I think a lot of people would be pretty unhappy [if you reduced housing density at the mall] because of what you wind up having to do in other districts” to compensate, she says. “The numbers have to work but it’s not impossible.”

March 18: Town Moderator Sarah Cannon Holden says that opposing viewpoints or amendments must be made from the floor of Town Meeting without slides, saying that other parties such as “the RLF may speak if they’re responding to a question, but I don’t know that they’re going be up there on their own.”

March 19: The Planning Board does not mention the possibility of a mall-related amendment at its meeting. Agricultural Commission Chair Louise Bergeron advocates for changes to restrict lighting and impervious surfaces in the HCA district. The board is generally receptive but says they can’t set requirements for the HCA district that don’t also apply to the entire town, and they’ll tackle those issues separately after the HCA issue is behind them.

“We can take this up right after Town Meeting,” board member Gary Taylor says. “We’ll get someone working on this. Right now we don’t have anything to pass… I’m glad you brought this up.”

Ironically, the board does vote to endorse Article 28, which would requires residents with property in areas under consideration for rezoning to be individually notified by mail at least 14 days before the meeting at which that discussion is expected to begin. “For something this significant, we really should not be springing votes on people,” Olson said in that context.

March 20: Holden affirms that the LRHA and Article 3 proponents would each get 10 minutes from the floor to present their positions.

March 23: On behalf of the RLF, Barnes proposes the amendment at Town Meeting. DeLisi herself is apparently surprised by the move, saying she “had the same [type of amendment] in her purse” to offer if had Barnes not done so.

Holden allows Barnes to present her amendment from the podium and show slides created by the RLF.

“Slides at Town Meeting are not reviewed by the moderator or the IT team. We send [IT Director] Michael Dolan a file and he makes sure it is available on the laptop. Nothing about the content of slides is coordinated ahead of time,” Olson says on March 27. Vaughn-Mackenzie confirms on March 28 that “the town did not make slides for the RLF.”

“The RLF was allowed to speak from the podium with slides because it is the largest property owner affected by the zoning amendment,” Holden tells the Squirrel on April 1. “They have worked closely with town officials throughout the process to come up with a plan. The voters needed to hear directly about that plan. In addition, the viability of the town’s commercial center has been a prominent concern of town residents.”

March 25: In response to the March 25 story about the HCAWG’s March 14 meeting, DeLisi writes in the Lincoln Squirrel that “none of what is being reported here was shared with both Eph Flint and myself.” She also says that she and Flint had decided “that an amendment was not the way to go — even though it was a step in the right direction and relieved some of the density we feared at the mall. The reason is that there were many other issues not yet discussed and still not, and there has been no consensus yet in town about how to do this right.”

On March 28, Vaughn-MacKenzie says, “The HCAWG meeting on March 14  was a public meeting which was properly noticed. No one — not Lynn, Eph, the RLF or anyone else who was thinking of bringing an amendment — needed to tell the Planning Board or each other what they were thinking of doing.”

March 27: “RLF and other parties, including Lynn DeLisi, who mentioned it on the floor of Town Meeting, requested the amendment language from the Planning Board,” McGean tells the Squirrel. “Without an advertised Planning Board public meeting, the RLF did not think it was correct to discuss with individual Planning Board members our possible intention. In the spirit of compromise, the RLF Board of Trustees decided to make the amendment on density at Town Meeting. In addition, we proposed to strike the special permit exception for the 33% commercial requirement. These two compromises were the result of significant public feedback we had received from some residents at RLF’s public forums, the numerous Planning Board meetings, and comments on LincolnTalk.”