Rezoning: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
- mcc021557
- May 4
- 3 min read
Meetings this week: The Community Development Board meeting on the Neighborhood Zoning is Wednesday May 7th at 6:30PM on Zoom only.
The next meeting on the Squares is the Q&A session on Thursday May 8th at 6:30PM at the Andrews School.
Today in tales of why you should read the zoning…
On Wednesday April 30th at 6PM, there was a meeting of the City Council Planning and Permitting Committee about the West Medford Square, Medford Square and ADU zoning. At 6:21PM, the draft of the West Medford and Medford Square zoning link was posted to the Zoom chat. Paying attention to the meeting and trying to read the zoning at the same time is a task that should not be placed on anyone. The zoning should have been released earlier especially as the plan was to vote it through that night (which they did).
West Medford Square has a zone called MX1 (as does Salem Street Corridor), the MX1 presented that night had 4 stories by right plus 1 story incentive in addition to allowing far more uses from clinics to marijuana businesses. MX-2 is broken down into MX-2A and MX-2B, but there is also a section that provides dimensional requirements and just lists MX-2 (which also exists on Salem Street Corridor) with a max height of 7 stories.
During my public comment, I asked if this would up zone Salem Street as the zones had the same names but different dimensional requirements. Alicia Hunt, the Director of Planning & Permitting Department, said that I was confused and that this had no effect on the Salem Street Corridor zoning because that was done. But is that true?
As you can see above, the intent is clearly laid out that these new heights and uses WILL BE APPLIED to Salem Street Corridor unless this section is removed. The city council planning and permitting committee voted the zoning through to have the city council pass it to the Community Development Board. Under this plan, MX-1 will go from max 4 stories to max 5 stories. MX-2 will go from max 6 stories to max 7 stories. This will also allow a whole host of new uses to both zones that include marijuana businesses and much more.
After reading all the way through the zoning, I emailed Alicia Hunt to ask for clarification.
I received a prompt response…
READ THE ZONING! There is only one way that this backward upzoning was included in this zoning and not noticed…if NO ONE IS READING THE ZONING!!!! It was 22 pages long. Page 13 literally contains nothing else than the text saying these zone changes will be applied going forward and backward to Mystic Avenue and Salem Street Corridors. If the zoning language is released too late for proofreading by the planning department and even a casual viewing by the city council planning and permitting committee, then they should not vote to move it forward.
One more thing. The ADU zoning that the City Council Planning and Permitting Committee voted to pass through DOESN’T EXIST. There literally is no zoning language written about ADUs, but they voted it forward because they didn’t bother to read. This is embarrassing and highly dangerous. The minimum we should be able to expect from our elected officials is that they read things before they unanimously vote to pass them.
The Squares Q&A session is on Thursday May 8th at 6:30PM at the Andrews School. Will they address these egregious errors or just put up a pretty PowerPoint that completely ignores the actual zoning? Stay tuned to find out…
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