Master Plan Working Group - Regular Meeting

[Music] okay so it is now 1 minute past 7 and we'll call this January 6 2025 meeting of the master plan working group to order we'll begin with a roll call Bob Carroll hi Bob's here Victoria Duckworth here Lindsay Fox here anarie Foley Here Deborah George Brian H Shantel Kimble essic Petri David Robbins is present Sue Robbins here Colleen Roy here all right that makes seven members is present which is sufficient to constitute a quorum so welcome everybody to the new new year and the continuation of our work and hopefully we'll be looking forward to having this work completed before the end of 2025 uh first item on our agenda first action item is approval of meeting minutes uh we have one minutes for September 30th of available for review um they were posted to the website everybody have a chance to review them is there a motion towards approving them we approve the meeting minutes from September 30th 2024 as presented second moved in second at any discussion I had one nit to uh on that

the uh under the closing chapter uh under the last major bullet item updates Safe Harbor achieved due to 160 Upton Street project I believe that 160 was intended to be 116 it's the only thing I noticed in the minutes that needed to be updated I am in my motion to include the changes as presented if the seconder is willing to agree to that seconding excellent so any further discussion of the motion hearing none Mr Carol now what happened to Bob we lost him Miss Duckworth um I miss Fox I miss buly buly I I see that Shantel Kimble has joined us so you get to vote on the motion Miss Kimble was it just um two prove minutes yes okay I Mr Robbins votes i m Robbins hi M Roy hi all righty motion carried unanimously uh on to the next item uh since our last meeting we've had three individuals resigning from the committee Linda hassinger Doren defasio and Julie Grace by submitting their resolation resignation they've been removed from the list of active committee members but uh number one the Committees should be

aware of this and number two a motion to for the committee to uh send their thanks for participation and regrets learning about the resignation that the committee accept Linda hassinger Daren deio and Julie Grace's resignation and send him a letter of appreciation second moved in second any discussion hearing none let's see Mr Carol oh Mr Carol is a about to join us we'll give him a moment Bob we're just voting on the motion to accept the resignations of the three members okay sorry I got the uh blue screen of death I haven't had that in a while my sympathies all right so your vote on the motion hey accept Miss Duckworth Miss Fox I miss buy buly I miss Kimbell hi Mr Robbins votes I Miss Robbins hi and M Roy hi motion carried unanimously um we'll move into the discussion item agenda we have the second draft of two chapters to review I'll let uh Sarah and Company take the lead on this Miss Miss Robbins yes I was just wondering if the uh minutes for November 6th and December 2nd are ready for

approval I have them on my agenda yes Fiona we weren't able to thanks thanks for bringing that up we weren't able to get them done in time unfortunately um and that was after we we thought we were going to be able to to meet that deadline but fortunately no but we should have all of them done by the next meeting thank you right anything else before we move into the chapter drafts okay so Elena and sah I guess you guys can uh sort of take kick this off which Which chapter draft do we want to discuss next and thank you Dave um yeah so unfortunately we were not able to complete edits for open space and Recreation for this time uh we'll leave this chapter for the next meeting so we'll start with the next item on the agenda um uh my colleague Rob will talk to us about Transportation so we'll go through the revisions of the transportation chapter thank you hi everyone uh great to great to meet you for the first time uh so we did have a number of uh revisions in the in the Matrix to take a look at um Elena I don't know if if you want me to if you want to pull it up or anything but um I think a lot of them uh were to kind of uh help take the chapter and Link it back to some previous plans uh that had gone in uh G on in town um uh noting the the open space and Recreation plan uh and and some recent plans that

have been done um so we we went back through and and looked at that uh one of the recommendations was to move from uh recommending a full uh study around the the town common uh and more so looking at some of the past plans uh and seeing some of the recommendations they had in and trying to incorporate it um perfect yeah um so so it's kind of looking at some of those different feasibility Solutions uh and trying to ground them in the in the past plans but but it there definitely does seem like there's still some appetite in the town to to look around the town common area which is kind of a a challenging historic area in town um so we're still looking at trying to uh do some of the some of the work around the town common um recommending uh taking a look at the parking um see here uh so one of the the main action items was was uh changing the the preparation of a transportation study for the common uh into actually focusing on the implementation of findings from PR uh previous uh and pending traffic studies uh so we did update that change uh we did note that there's a lot of uh work that's been done around low impact development and how that impacts Transportation uh the town of Grafton like like many Central Mass towns uh has seen a lot of uh Warehouse development uh in in recent times and that certainly has a big impact on the transportation Network so uh looking at some of the the rules and regulations around subdivisions and and other developments and trying to incorporate those low impact development principles uh whether it be uh trying to incorporate Transit uh into the development uh grafting does

have a pretty strong uh Transit presence with uh uh its uh shuttle Roots provided by the WRTA or if it's something like uh trying to reduce the number of uh parking spaces that are actually built as part of the the development uh and then just scrolling down a little bit uh linking the the transportation chapter with some of the open space and Recreation uh pieces uh that the the town has been going through uh a big piece of that is the Blackstone River Greenway um it there's kind of a a grafton's kind of in the the section of the greenway that is uh kind of in limbo to be developed uh the route is still being worked on a little bit uh so incorporating that into the master plan was important because uh as we're seeing a lot of these uh larger scale um long-distance bike trails get developed uh it's kind of in a way becoming a a new form of transportation uh so we're seeing a lot of those long-distance routes like the mass Central rail trail or the the balt that's being built uh that's looking at taking uh or providing the opportunity for people to to walk or ride their bike or another alternative Mota Transportation um you know through many different towns so incorporating that into this m plan I feel like is very important uh let's see here scrolling down uh I think another important aspect that uh we worked on following the comments uh were some of the uh the burdens I think that are being put on on the town especially the the Department of Public Works uh the Double part uh because the DPW um is kind of being asked to maintain all of this infrastructure uh they're being asked to maintain their current infrastructure you know Road sidewalks but then uh when we're expanding sidewalks uh looking at new

forms of transportation through bikeways um uh uh multi-use pass things like that uh there's an added burden on them uh to to maintain this infrastructure whether it's uh maintaining it in good condition or clearing snow and ice from it um and and with that uh drafton is an MS2 community so there's certain requirements on them to to do maintenance on their uh uh drainage infrastructure street sweeping regularly things like that that are kind of these unfunded mandates uh so one thing that we recommended uh and unfortunately it's it's not really something that can be done as part of this chapter uh is to to look at you know whether the DPW and the other uh parts of the town government that are asked to maintain this infrastructure you know really have the funding that they need to to do so uh because we we see in our transportation work that uh towns just don't have enough money to maintain the the just the simple pavement they have on their roads uh and when you're you know asked to to get some of this more specialized equipment uh it's really impossible for them to maintain it so uh we think it's a good idea to look into uh whether or not the there actually is you know the the funding available the the people available and uh and then following that as this stuff is built out uh it would be important to to make sure that there's a kind of maintenance aspect considered as you know the the network is is continuously developed um let's see here uh and then just kind of uh trying to uh recommend some different ways for safe fruits to school that was an important uh aspect uh uh that that seems to have brought been brought up and it's also important for the the Safe Systems approach which has really been weave throughout the the transportation master plan uh so we talk about trying

to get the town more involved uh in the safe Ro of school program uh they they actually already have a tip project uh being funded kind of through the safe roots to school program which is great uh but just kind of talks about how the the more involvement that a town has in some of these programs uh the better the opportunity is for them to to get funding um and really the safe rusa school program is is a great way to to improve safety not only for for kids getting to school uh but but really for all Road users as uh improving those uh infrastructures you know it's not just a you know uh if I were to walk down the street they're going to say you're not a school kid you can't walk on the sidewalk it's it's really a sidewalk for everyone so those were kind of the some of the main topics that I I feel like uh really came out in the uh um uh in in the comments that we had received I don't know if there there's anything else that anyone would like to discuss or this is Fiona Town planner I just wanted to thanks Rob for going through that um and and kind of walking us through some of these comments I don't have anything additional I think the only thing that I would just reiterate which you know you've done and cmrpc has been continuing to do is just bearing in mind what we have kind of currently going on in town because there are quite a lot of things as you mentioned you know the tip project that DPW is working on the um common um traffic assessment work um and just kind of how that relates to the long-term um goals and objectives of what we're trying to accomplish in town so um but yeah great job thank you so

much reading through this I noticed a couple of essentially typos all uh I I'll add those to the to the comment workbook I don't need to spend any time discussing them tonight unless someone really wants to let me just check my notes Here anything H let me see all right one I think the only thing that I'll I'll I'll mention tonight and again this is a little bit little bit of offline work to uh figure this out but under goal three an example of the lack uh an example of multimodal resources being disconnected and fragmented you the the document has shows or States as an example of this is the lack of sidewalks on Carrol Street actually Carroll Road leading towards the Grafton Station and um to me that's not a very good example because adding sidewalks to K Road doesn't really help as far as access to the tea station is concerned because that would never be on a walking route to the tea station which is another three miles past the end of of the of Carol Carol Road but I started in my

notes on this I thinking there probably are some good examples of multi toal resources being disconnected I don't know any off the top of my head but um I was thinking of things like sparse bus routes and bus stops where they we have them but they're few and far between and don't connect very well uh we have discontinuous sidewalks in places where walking would be feasible if we had sidewalks and uh we can talk about the lack of bike Lanes bike Lanes also you know sort of contributing to uh disconnected and fragmented multibot resources so con I I think it's it's it's it's a good thing to mention here that uh you know we are what we have for multimedia multimodal resources aren't as plentiful as we would like and they're not connected as well as we like and that's a good point to make I just like I just like to use a good example to make the point yeah absolutely we can we can take a look at that and maybe even build out little like a table or something that that lists a few different examples yeah I mean you we we certainly don't need to attempt to exhaustively list all the all the issues here but you know at least a couple of examples to illustrate the point would be helpful I just you that that as an example didn't didn't strike me as a good example to illustrate the point Colleen I have a good example it's not near the um train station but Elmwood Street that's the street I live on has sidewalks on either end and it's close to a school but in the middle there's no sidewalk so it doesn't it just if you connect it all the way and then more kids could walk to school yeah that that's the kind of thing I'm thinking of

that that that does does make for an appropriate example it not not so much I mean you walking to access the tea station is you know there that's kind of kind of a just sort of limited in its applicability but but more broadly you know examples like Colleen just brought up are are the kind of thing that I had in mind that would make good examples Brian yes thank you uh Dave Carol rude in terms of example to T to the T Station you're right it's a it's a stretch to call it a good example but I would say as an example Carol Road would be uh to access downtown it's only a a mile from from stoping shop um it's right an important uh way to get to the school for a lot of people in this neighborhood um so you know does I guess it could get into you know although it doesn't go to the tea uh you know in terms of a good example but those types of things uh you know in terms of getting into into the downtown area and also to the school yeah so I mean yeah right so you Carol Road just as Carol Road is not entirely inappropriate here it's just that what value would adding sidewalks to Carol Road have you know exactly as you say Brian and just another Point um you know there's I think there's a big push in in town um for sidewalks for obvious reasons you you know the sidewalk Network as we've discussed is it's disjointed and a lot of mean thoroughfares could benefit from having them but in talking to DPW because this is kind of always on our radar you know the big thing and things that we don't

think of are like or that like you know the average person wouldn't think of is that you're having to upgrade drainage um alongside um sidewalks as well because you're adding you know impervious surface and Curbing and that's going to create a significant um flow of water and then you start talking ms4 and then we're getting into so I think that that's I think that what we're discussing here is like yeah like key th you know key thoroughfares in town you know we would really like to to see and focus on and then with the long-term goal of maybe do um um going out just because it is and and of course you know a strip of sidewalk it could you know is quite expensive even for just a small portion so I'm always trying to think of like how and and during this process like what what makes the most sense um Now versus what makes sense 10 years from now and then 20 because hopefully at that point you know the sidewalk network network will gradually be built out and um but yeah just just kind of a food for thought it's just from conversations that I've had with DBW director because we recently had um a town meeting article that was approved to try and find funding for sidewalks on o Westboro road which is a long pretty popular stretch in town but it's all country kind of like natural country drainage on that road so it's been interesting to try and figure out how that's going to work so just a comment there Brian yeah i' say that with all the sidewalks that go into town from the South Street North Street uh from uh

Church Street from Milbury Road uh from uh most of the roads that connect to the center of the town have sidewalks I think Carol Road is the only street that doesn't have a sidewalk that connects to town so I'm going to push for that to be um you know brought up and and and put on to the long-term plan uh because it's it's really the only only Street I think that hasn't doesn't have sidewalks uh you know heading to town so thank you thanks any other comments on the transportation chapter here P I'm sorry it's me again but I would just love to have in um and you know right let me know if this is an overreach and maybe not something that's appropriate necessarily for the master plan but I would love to have like strong examples of of like things that Comm like that Grafton can do especially when it comes to um bike Lanes I find that it's been um it's really tough unless it's on a state road and unless you like have like a development that's coming before the town for a uh permit and then we're trying to you know like push for hey you know this is a this location is on a main um you know thoroughfare we would really like to see a bike lane to connect or something like that I feel like that's it's kind of peac meal that these things come together and I think you know admittedly like I'm not I I think I I would be interested because I think we have a bicycle plan in town um there's a push like

regionally for more bike lanes and Grafton obviously wants to do their part as well as we've seen but I would just love like and we don't have to talk about it now but examples of um how that's been successfully done in some of these communities and and how like working with property owners like should like certain PE like should like should like the town planner for example be like addressing people I I I I guess I'm just I I would love a little bit of that too I I think that would be super helpful because any assistance or ideas to help Implement some of these like larger scale things I think are always is always a benefit and same thing with rail Trails I have this like hang up about rail trails that I find them challenging okay thanks fion and Marie yeah I just want to say I wholeheartedly agree um with Fiona I would love to see something in here um as brief as it it may be that at least we're thinking along those lines moving forward um and then connecting with you know neighboring towns with their bike paths and whatnot I think we can we can definitely take a look at that I I know you know city of worcester's a little bit of a different example but they've had a lot of success uh recently when they've been repaving because you know they have these four-lane roads that they really don't need to be four lane so they've and bringing them down to two lanes and putting in some some cool infrastructure I think Mill Street is a is a is a recent example but might not exactly work in Grafton but I I think we might be able to try to find some uh smaller examples that would be that would be helpful yeah I think you know sort of you know anything we can include in this uh in this chapter of the master plan anything we can include to sort of

you emphasize among other things that yeah we we we we like roads we like Transit uh sidewalks are very very visible and you for as long as I lived in this town people have been asking complaining about the lack of sidewalks and so that's that's sort of a long-term emphasis but TR Trails as another another form of Transit there's we we we we pay a lot of attention to Trails but we haven't paid that much attention to bike train to bike Transportation so putting putting a little bit more emphasis on that and and uh planning ahead for the next 10 or 20 years to you know to find Opportunities to improve bike Transit and Grafton and and yet it doesn't mean the same thing here as it might mean in in Worcester or even some other some other towns with a different sort of a street NK a lot a lot of our roads are Old Country Roads and you know you really there's really no opportunity whatsoever for even sidewalks much less bike Lanes but to but to explore the possibilities that that we can adapt to Grafton would be I think a good a good objective or in in the master plan somewhere and Marie uh yeah thank you Dave just a caveat that this is timely because starting in 2026 the pan Mass challenge will be coming through Grafton it'll be a good way to see how thousands of bikers uh navigate South Grafton yep cool anything else on Transportation if not you know well and as as I said earlier I've got a few comments that I'll I will add to the comment workbook uh so if anybody else as you continue to review it and think about it

particularly think think about what we talked about tonight you know you plug your comments into the comment workbook and uh get the cmrpc staff to uh continue to work on this it's looking pretty good so far anything else if not we'll move on to the next one and if I could add if you could date your comments so that we uh we make sure we keep track of what was added after we uh talked about the second round of edits um that would be very helpful so if you can remember to do that that would be great um we will move on to housing and I think it's easier if I share my screen for this my colleague Emily uh Glitz who is um in charge of our housing production plans she wrote and edited this chapter she responded directly to your comments um and I will do my best to um talk about the edits that she made um but I may not be able to point to a specific comment but I will just go through the the main additions that she she completed for this chapter so um I will start with um an action item that points to conducting a suitability assessment for each Village area valuating as existing land conditions built environment and other factors that influence the development of multif family housing so this is specifically focused on the Village area and I wanted to bring up here Fiona if if you think this may not be a good time to bring this up um we received a

comment from Justin Hollander um with this idea of incorporating um uh this concept of new towns in how we approach density in specific areas in town he was specifically looking at undeveloped underdeveloped Parcels um and you know I think New Towns have a specific history a specific um background I don't know if we need to invoke New Towns when we talk about housing but I think if we are to pick up on that concept and I don't know if the working group had a chance to review that um I think this would be the opportunity to do it where we talk about the village centers and how we can um concentrate development around the village centers and how we can analyze them for suitability um obviously this would involve a lot of infill um Justin's idea was um looking at completely underdeveloped land um Fiona you have your hand up yeah thanks L I just wanted to to make a point that I think that this probably would would be the most logical area to kind of evaluate that that concept and I think it it makes like it's it's scalable right like that this makes sense no matter what I think you know a su like a suitability assessment for the potential for buildout for these key areas in town um is something you know we always we always want to understand truly like the real estate value and the market value and and what we can um how we can properly capitalize on these areas and a way that makes sense for graft and so yeah I just wanted to to kind of comment that I I agree with you I think this makes perfect sense I just had a question as well and I know you

didn't write this chapter so I can just shoot Emily an email as well but is this looking at like um land to like building values and like that type of ratio like I've seen that before in master plans where they'll they'll do that type of analysis or is this just kind of we did that in the economic development chapter oh that's right I'm sorry okay no no that's fine because that really was focused or or the discussion was focused on Commercial it's completely applicable to housing I don't see why we couldn't refer back to that data um but yes that's that's where we did that okay yeah that's perfect I I just wanted to make sure that that was if that was kind of what we were looking at here but this seems a little bit BR broader and that that that specific kind of calculation is more lives in Economic Development that's that's a good place for it so thank you yeah I think sorry on this topic if I may the uh the The Village centers that we' be looking at really there's a you know they combine residential and Commercial and so the the areas that we would be looking at and the ways we would be looking at them really the the the residential angle and the commercial angle complement one another and they really at least in my my conception of of this focus on on mixed use Village areas is that we we really take a look at them you both at at the same time we look at it both from a residential and a commercial point of view so there's really a a close coordination between this particular spot in the housing and population chapter and the the the Village Center Spot in the commercial

the excuse me the economic development chapter and kind of we kind of want to make sure that we've we we understand the relationship there that really each of those depends upon the other and so you know you know talking both about you know what are the village centers which I think we we got into a little bit more detail on what the village centers are when we were talking Economic Development chapter a meeting or two ago but we really want to sort of you look at these together like I said when we're talking Village centers mixed we're talking mixed use Village centers that combine commercial and residential so we want to make sure that in the master plan we're sort of you we we we we are connecting those two areas in in a way that makes sense and you know the assessment that's on the screen now you really I think you really want to look at both the residential and Commercial aspects together on that changing the subject for a moment on Justin hollander's new Town's idea his basic idea is to create a brand new Village Center on on unused land and U there are some some aspects of that that make me skeptical about whether that concept can be made to work in Grafton but you know you again here when we're talking about existing Village centers to to bring in the concept of maybe there's a place in Grafton where a new Village Center could be created is sort of the idea is to take take an area that's sufficiently large and appropriately located and basically you let let some developer you know sort of go to town you sort of design a village from the ground up uh and it I think the idea has some Merit again there's not as there's not as much

land in Grafton actually available for something like that as Justin might think there is but still if we're going to talk about that in the master plan this is one place where we can talk about it yeah thanks for that point David and I think also Market considerations um for whether or not and and they go beyond the scope of this chapter for whether or not a quote unquote new town or New Village Center could take root um you know arguably [Music] um you know people look for acreage in Grafton not necessarily density high density living um and I think that could feasibly be done with infill um again we we would have to do a market study for that but to create a brand brand new Village Center is um yeah yeah like I said I'm somewhat skeptical that that idea could be made to work here but uh you it's probably worth at least exploring the possibility but yes there are a lot of there are a lot of factors when I when I looked over that you know Justin sent me sent that to me I don't know how widely he shared it but uh anyway when he he sent that out and I I read through it and I I have a lot of questions about you know the some of the some of the details that would help to understand is this something that could possibly be made to work so Mar you had your hand up yeah given that we're spending time in this I didn't see that document I'm not sure if other people on the committee did yeah I suspect he didn't share it with the whole committee yeah I I can actually answer so I can um send that um that information I I he sent me to he he sent it to my my the in an incorrect email address for me and I only um kind

of caught it later on but um I I did tell him you know I I forwarded the comment to Elena and just said you know this is something that he had he had mentioned it previously in I forget which meaning it was um a few months ago um but yeah I agree you know I think we need to the committee needs to kind of re read the work and kind of understand understand a little bit more I just I do like to um make sure that I'm forwarding and honoring any comments that I that I get just to make sure that I'm I'm covering on my basis but yeah I mean I you know again CM you know cmrpc team I think it's it might be Pro probably beyond the SC beyond the scope of of what we can do um at this at this stage of the game but I'll forward the information I'll make sure it's part of the next agenda as well yeah you know I I would add it this could be achieved with you know zoning and Zoning incentives so you you can certainly zone for that type of concept um I think if we are to discuss this concept we have to talk about infrastructure so that type of investment needs to be made along with the proper Zoning for something like this to take road so I think we would need in pointing out the feasibility of this concept which is actually a good concept um that may work close to Boston where you know there's a density of jobs um it it it may work in Grafton as well but I think it's our responsibility to discuss to call it into question in some ways yeah per perhaps at most what we do in the master plan is sort of a brief description of the con concept and kind of a a list of what we can think of off the top of our heads

as what would need to be evaluated and what might need to be done to make this a possibility and yes among my notes on that in infrastructure was there yeah yeah thank you David for that point maybe that's how we approach it um the you know a a call to action in the sense that the town should evaluate um feasibility so yeah that that would be probably um I think I know what the result would be but I I don't want to prejudge anything um and I mean there are precedents there's New Jersey as Justin pointed out in his writings so there there's certainly precedents in the US there's no you know it can be done it can be done it it's just is it practical for here and we don't you right we can't say that off the top of our head that we know it would be um I will move on to the next chapter unless you uh I'm sorry next action item unless you have any other questions on this topic so David to your point um we are definitely thinking of this in terms of mixed use so both commercial and housing um and we're following up with action items that point to that so um the next one being Implement regulatory changes that can be expected to incentivize higher density multif family development um such as the expansion of Village mixed du zoning and improvements to allow for greater flexibility permitting multif family

residential um mixed use and so on so the next action item kind of ties into the previous one um and gets at um the regulatory changes that would be needed to achieve that and Brian you have a question yes the question I have is I think back in 1988 we voted as a town I wasn't here but uh on combining Lots words you had a quake a lot that was not going to meet the new specs of a Halfacre you had to combine the property and that happened with a number of properties in town including one of the ones I own now um so um in terms of the density question um are we addressing that um in this this overall plan uh because what that has done especially in South Grafton it has taken away the ability in some space and some spaces to uh to maybe have more housing you know if you wanted to have more um which we do uh and um also with the 2006 initiative in going back and redoing what was an R3 district and making it residential 20 um it took away from a few streets in the neighborhood in southcraft and to have the ability to have mixed juice so um and some cases it makes sense others it doesn't so um I'm wondering if this is um

examining those aspects of it as well that's so so that is the intent of this action item um but we could specifically address that we we do address that in the land use chapter but maybe we can address it in the terms that you've just outlined so if you if you could leave that as a common um either in the land use or the housing uh chapter tabs on the spreadsheet that would be fantastic yeah I I should point out that later on in this chapter we do have an action item that says review and pursue local zoning changes to eliminate regulations that disincentivize two family three family and other diverse types of housing so that that action item would also address some of what Brian just brought up exactly yeah thank you um this next action item um also gets at incentives but um in the sense of um it this addresses feasibility of development um and financial incentives in particular so um identify and pursue opportunities to leverage funding or other incentives to support multif family development in Village areas um um and the intent of this is to address fluctuating market conditions uh we didn't refer to Pine Street here but it was our understanding that this is really a case in which Market fluctuations intervene to put a development on hold so um if it all possible this is um you know encouraging

the town to pursue this type of incentives to um mitigate these Market changes cost of money that makes the development feasible and so on um and some of the opportunities outlined are tax relief Capital subsidies density bonuses which we address again later on in the chapter um dimensional relief decreased parking ratios expedited permitting reduction of land costs um Brownfield site remediation incentives um and other uh funding incentives for Housing Development any questions about this action item moving on to the next one um this flexible development zoning bylaw um you've corresponded with this with Mike uh so this this addresses um this action item addresses that topic um review and update existing flexible development zoning bylaw to offer stronger incentives for more compact development and open space preservation and then moving on to the next one unless you have questions so feel free free to stop me if you have questions um this one is um you know we have to we had to change gears a little bit after um the ad accessory dwelling units

um of the the Housing Act came out um and this is sort of calling for aligning access accessory zoning adus bylaw to align with Section 8 of chapter 150 of the acts of 2024 to promote adus um so this is responding to the change in legislation at the state level colen you have a question and this is kind of probably directed at fion so I apologize the to fall in line with the Adu bylaw and it's not specifically going to be what I'm saying in the sense that town meeting we just tried to amend the zoning where local businesses could add dwelling units above their business and while that's not specifically in this act that would help support that correct could that be a goal of ours to try to bring that zoning back here is would it make sense to put it here probably I I think I think that was that's that specific concept is covered somewhere in this chapter you know the the Adu is really not not relevant to a mixed use it's it's it's strictly an an accessory dwelling to a residential principal dwelling so that by the way this by the time the master plan is published it's quite possible that we will have done this as we're we're we're right now planning and having it at the Maytown meeting but which is sort of as we are writing this right now yes it's it's definitely an action item but yeah to to your point Colleen I I saw somewhere and I don't remember off the top of my head now whether it was

before or after where we're looking at right now but that that specific topic is covered here somewhere it is that's right yeah that we specifically talk about housing on top of commercial um and it it was in the context of Village mixed use I believe um I apologize I I can't think of the exact action item but we definitely address it and Marie it's just uh two items ago items yeah yes keep going I think or yeah let's see just above that it's and it's quite specific and I was I know it's there because I was thinking that we we have it here and yet the town just recently you know voted against this but that's it right there gu my question was more in the sense of like could that potentially be supporting the acts but since the accessor dwelling units are more for residential and this is kind of aligning with commercial I could see why they would be different yes that you know that that that new law had nothing to do with the residential above commercial and there' be there's there's no way we could make it fit even though I I will say that the the draft regulations for the for the Adu it's who knows it it's very confusing right now and they haven't submitted final regs and that's kind of neither neither here nor there but it calls into question okay are we opening like it could potentially open up to these districts so just kind of to Colleen's point you know it's we're we're kind of seeing this play out in

real time and the state's like trying to figure it out as they go along and it's because it it could apply you know to pre-existing non-conforming structures which is like the majority of housing in every town because they're all built in you know early 1900s mid 1900s so anyway don't want to go down too much of a rabbit hole with that but it is important to know too because they haven't addressed how Title 5 will come into play and when you're adding additional bedrooms on people with septic systems and when we're thinking about environmental impact that is something to be mindful of um especially since they haven't covered it yet yep should be interesting next few weeks because the law comes into effect on the second so we're all just February 2nd so yeah good stuff all right moving on to the next one um and Gabe will talk to us about the action item related to MBTA and that's coming up Gabe okay this is not the one right this is about barriers to um two family and three family um and this is where we could we could get more specific about um lot size and other barriers to to family dwellings and three family dwellings um and this is in response to a comment um that was left in the spreadsheet as well about two family unit being allowed by special permit um but it's essentially the spirit of this action item is um removing barriers Fiona go ahead yeah just to elaborate slightly further Elena this was increasing um kind of the missing middle type of housing was a

recommendation in our housing production plan our 2023 housing production plan so that was definitely you know I'm glad to see that's that's reiterated here as well we always kind of want to make sure we're we're coupling these planning efforts so thanks for that yeah moving on to the next one uh this was also in response to a comment um regarding linkage fees and the action item is calling for researching appropriate ways to establish linkage fees to fund affordable housing development and the reason we said research instead of directly saying Implement um is this is really Market specific so this uh again comparing markets it it would work in Boston um would it work in in in Grafton um it it would really call for an assessment of both commercial and residential um and a market assessment to see if something like this could be feasible and we're not um causing any unintended consequences such as disincentivizing development um but we we call for an assessment of that Fiona go ahead oh I'm sorry that was from the last time oh okay okay um and then any any questions about Lage fees if not I can move on to the next action item um Gabe can tell you more about we this is in response to our discussion about MBTA

communities uh yeah so uh I basically based on our last conversation about um the MBTA DTA project kind of exploring um doing some sort of incentivization process for to encourage mixed use residential development um I think the my my understanding was the consensus of the committee um as well as the uh the planning board was that this isn't something that is in the immediate future of Grafton um but I do think in general it's clearly a goal of the town to get more commercial development get more mixed use development so yeah this action item is basically just kind of laying out kind of the broad Strokes of what we'd like to see happen uh explore the development of regulatory incentives to promote mixed use commercial and residential development in identified neighborhoods um and then we're CED getting unit density bonuses building hyp bonuses and fee wavers um that could promote additional development in key areas of town uh including MBTA communities multif family zoning compliance districts um so kind of just trying to get to the core of what uh yeah what we what we worked on this year regarding that um and I mean we can we can try to get more specific about it but it felt like the committee kind of wanted to keep this broad uh for the time being because this could be maybe a an initiative to to explore in the next few years yeah I should uh it occurs to me to note that this ties into an earlier action item under goal one the action item was identify and pursue opportunities to leverage funding or other incentives to support multif family development in Village areas and that's very similar to uh in fact the incentives in that action item could

very well include this somewhat more specific idea of incentives so at the very least was kind of you know we kind of want to look at this and how it relates to some other action items and and ultimately see that there's a connection yeah when Elena read that I for like 10 seconds thought she was reading my action item yeah I mean the tools are very similar I just wonder if this needs to be Standalone because the goal is to hint at NBTA communities we could reward it so that we don't list the same series of density bonuses or other incentives but do does this need to be its own or do you think we need we could fold it into the other one with the incentives th those are Financial incentives primarily and Zoning yeah I think to one of the things that suggests to me is that you know once we've kind of got everything lined up here everything pretty much the way we think we want it we want to look for similarities and connections and uh it kind of reminds me going back to the 2001 master plan uh a few years ago I went through that and listed every one of the recommendations it made and found a number of duplicate recommendation duplicates are essentially duplicates that the same recommend recommendation was made two or three or four different places there were something like 220 some recommendations but that boiled down to 195 distinct recommendations and so that's kind of thing we want to particularly as each of these develop each of these chapters are developed more or less independently from one another you know we're going to find that there are

commonalities we we talked earlier about commonalities between housing and economic development when it came to mixed use Village areas and we're seeing here commonalities of the the more General concept of incentives to support multif family development and some more specific ideas of incentives that that that may be tuned more towards a particular zone or a particular you know subset of all possible development so uh as we review the everything as we start reviewing everything together we want to see where these commonalities are and duplications are and you know something may well be worth mentioning in two different places but we want to make sure if if it's essentially the same thing or if it's two parts of what really can be the same thing we want to make sure that ultimately we we get them tied together and coordinated and consistent with one another yeah I mean um yeah I I think we can address the redundancy in this one for sure um my my question still is do we want to refer directly to MBTA communities in some way is this something that we need to highlight um and and David you you're absolutely right there's some redundancies between especially between land use and housing that we really to address yeah my my opinion uh specifically on incentivized incentiv incentives for mixed use residential development that does not apply just to MBTA communities and I don't think it applies differently to the MBTA zones than to any other Zone in which we allow mixed use I think the the idea is incentives that will make it more likely for us

to realize some uh mixed use development you wherever the Zone might be that it takes place in is there a different angle with which to approach the MBTA communities or not really because the the MBTA Community Zone consists of five mixed use zones of basically two different types and we've taken uh two Village mixed use zones or parts of Village mixed use zones combine them with three three 40R smart growth overlay District zones and that's our NBTA zone so it's not much of a leap to say that right now in all of our village mixed use zones and all of our 40R zones that's where mixed use goes and so there's very little difference between mixed use in MBTA versus mixed use in any other Zone they're they're practically the same thing and there's so there's no real need to there there's nothing unique about the MBTA zoning that calls for a different approach unlike other towns which have you know created NBT zones out of something entirely different we were fortunate that we had pre-existing zones that already met the requirements for NBTA zoning so we we we we we just had to call them the NBTA Zone and we were done right um no thanks for that Insight I think I think we should probably take this action item merge it with the previous one um leave that reference to MBTA communities if you think it's it's

something that needs to be in the master plan for future if if it sets a direction that the town needs to call out we can leave that reference in and then merge this one with the prior action item that you called out David yeah I just just a comment that I mean I think that the reason they were uh called out specifically was because the MBTA community's overlay kind of was more targeted toward you know as Dave mentioned you know it was areas that were already the zoning already nothing changed in the underlying zoning we just put an overlay over it but it definitely was targeted at areas that were already um kind of highlighted for development and where this kind of larger might maybe more kind of creative um zoning would come into play as opposed to the um some of the the vmu where we did hear that people liked the kind of Village type of mix use with you know kind of maintaining the three story height um and that type of thing I I I and I could be off base but I think I that's how that's why I'm recalling that these were called out separately is because the MBTA communities overlay districts are capitalizing on places that already are slided for kind of more larger scale mixed use um types of development Styles and then the other vmu areas the town and F folks in you know want want to see kind of not something of that scale more kind of local character type and and smaller scale type of development yeah I mean just just for

the background too like we were very limited in writing the MBTA zoning about what we could like encourage um there that that was kind of the idea is like maintaining that Spirit of the zoning district with that the high amount of uh housing by right while figuring out a way to make try to make mixed use more attractive than just doing a straight uh all market rate development apartment building um because the way that the state like if I think if kind of thinking Blue Sky if if Fiona and I could we probably would have said oh we should just like oh if you want to build this you you have to do mixed use that' be cool just put mixed use there but the state didn't wasn't interested in that I don't know if that be viable um so that was that was why mvta was called out was specifically is is is there is there a viable workaround that we can get to encourage other types of development in these districts Ryan yeah yeah so it seems to me that um what I'm hearing is that the MBTA mix shes was obviously the law that was created that incentivized and made it so that you you would have to do this what we've been discussing in Grafton for a long time you know side by side with this decision to do the NBA by the state is the mixed juice within our Villages and that hasn't change so to me it seems like um it's redundant to say MBA and then separate out Mixed shoes for everybody else as different somehow it's um don't think you need to toh necessarily say MB MBTA uh you know I don't know if that's going to what Dave already said or not but

uh you know we were kind of already discussing it you know for various villages with within our town so uh you know why not just say mix juice and leave out the NBTA that's my opinion anyway yeah I think it it occurs me to realize that the MBA zoning actually is does not put any emphasis on mixed use NBTA zoning was about building multif family dwellings so it was all about fostering the development residential development ideally in and around in in uh Transit areas so it was all about residential development not about mixed use and in fact they some towns or some communities wanted a way to get some mixed use development counted towards the MBTA zoning and so there was a modification of the regulations that they made to allow a certain amount of that so the emphasis you going back to gab's point that the the idea of coming up with incentives for mixed use development in an MBTA District was to sort of provide an alternative sort of a way to encourage mixed use despite the fact that MBT is not particularly interested in mixed use so that's sort of where that that's kind of I think where this came from uh but going back to the other the basic concept of mixed use development I think you know I think it's in our interest to find ways to incentivize mixed use development anywhere where we can allow mixed use development we sort of there's sort of

an example of that at 1727 Upton Street where we embarked on that project hoping and expecting to get some mixed use development out of it uh the economics basically ended up you know economics and site conditions ended up uh not aot not supporting that but with more incentives to support mixed use that site might possibly have ended up as mixed use certainly like to like to find more incentives for mixed use wherever mixed use might possibly be developed in Grafton which is primarily the other Village mixed use districts we've got a 40R the Fisherville Mill site which has yet to be developed that's also as a 40R it qualifies for mixed use and in fact I think on one part of that we actually had a requirement for a uh there's basically two parts to that site on on one part it's required not optional to build a mixed use there okay thank you for that context um so is there consensus on removing the reference or including the context that you've just explained that mixed use near Transit and Grafton pretty much meets the requirement and many other goals yeah I I think after looking about this and after we've talked about it kind of leaving this you know written the way it is um we're talking about mixed use development

in key areas of town including the NBTA District so it doesn't I I don't think it detracts from this by saying that anarie yeah I think we could just leave it as it is okay great thanks for your input um I'm if there no other questions I will I think there may be one more action item bear with me here um this is in response to an item that Fiona uh brought up under the comment spreadsheet um this action item calls for hiring a dedicated full-time staff member to oversee a affordable housing initiatives um and um I believe also to deal with affordable housing funding um and CPA as well yeah I just maybe qu some quick additional um you know this is just I I I made this recommendation because of what I've seen my dayto day and what I'm dealing with um and we did do a just for the working group's own um knowledge is we entered into a pilot cmrpc had done had um kind of a Regional Housing coordinator that was working with a bunch of different communities but it became obvious in that time that Grafton definitely had a lot more going on than some of the other communities that were opting into that program it was like like mendan was one of the towns B Berlin like they were like smaller scale towns and and Grafton was seeing a lot

more activity and I think as we're continuing to see activity it's something that I think the working group should should should consider and and really talk about this because obviously recommending to hire somebody it's a big financial decision for a town um but with new developments coming online monitoring the Shi doing kind of certification letters and working with the state and D you know help coordinating approvals for regul agreements and lip approvals and all sorts of stuff I mean really you know I have had instances in like my office where I've had to just put it back you know try and delegate things as much as possible or it or it waits and and and it's there's just a lot that's involved with monitoring affordable housing and and and I think it's and I've seen communities that as they get to a certain point this is this is the kind of thing that they these are kind of positions that they start thinking about um and this could be again like longer term down the road um thought and Fiona on the on the um topic of shi we have the new numbers that you sent um the E eohc hasn't updated their website obviously but we can use right the the units are built Safe Harbor is achieved we can use that updated information right yeah the um the 99.1% yeah yeah and we are you know the

zba is declared twoyear Safe Harbor which we're in because of 116 Upton but you know as I as I kind of continue to caution all the time and as you folks see RPC no I mean it's it's it's always the sliding scale that we're keeping an eye on because if building permits aren't pulled in a year the units fall off if they are pulled but they don't pull their certificates of occupancy in a year then they fall off again so it's it's just and and obviously as more units are developed in a town the denominator of that calculation grows so you need it's just it's always this it's a sliding scale so I just kind of always caution about like I think that my point being is that when we're referencing that Elena maybe we just make it clear that it's a snapshot in time in this immedi moment and just say you know subject to subject to fluctuation and change with based on development patterns or or however you know you want to word it that makes sense thank you and Marie I was just gonna ask if you could scroll down so we could see the things that are included in this thanks if I if I may quickly to make a point about I I've seen a lot of towns that have a c CPC coordinator so maybe that's something to consider as well it doesn't have to be maybe specifically housing because most communities that are like Grafton they're funding most of their housing initiatives with CPC funding and they that person kind of takes on those those two roles you know they're overseeing

CPC but and they're specializing in in Housing Services as well like it it's every Community does it a little bit differently um but because you know obviously this is this is the housing chapter I um it was worded this way but all right Su you have your hand up um I agree with everything f is saying except that I don't think CPA should be I think it should be kept separate because um they don't invest a lot of money from their CPA into the um affordable housing trust but I think that hiring somebody um who can take care of all of this and look at the policies and bring us some actual information and facts on affordable housing and how much it is needed and everything else would be of value to this town so I support hiring a whatever we're going to call it I can't see the name you scroll but somebody to do that and yes it costs money but it would be worth the in assment uh we we called them you know we didn't call them a certain title but we pointed to their duties which is oversee affordable housing initiatives but yeah reward that if you think it needs to Encompass some specific things and Marie um I was gonna say just CP Community preservation um acting committee does dedicate a fair amount of money to affordable housing I mean we're probably over a million dollars since it's Inception I think met

to date maybe since in Inception but a yearly they only give what's required and that's not even close to taking care of our needs for affordable housing and I think somebody who has the time because they aren't going to have the time they're volunteers if we hired somebody who could do this even on a part-time basis hire somebody who um can look at this objectively I think we we need this colen so I agree with what Sue is saying but respectfully I think we should keep um the CPA portion in there while they do do their minimum 10% required each year they can give additional funding so citing them as a funding source to help pay for this position where it wouldn't really necessarily tax um residents anymore because we have a funding source between um CPA and the the trust but the the trust is not going to have um they're not going to be as flush as they were're used to once they're done with their 1727 uping Grant right I wasn't suggesting we eliminate CPA from this um discussion but I certainly think somebody independent should be hired for the town oh is this thing it should be somebody from CPC or using CPA funding maybe I'm misunderstanding because I think it should be using CPA funding should help support this position but not necessarily a member of CPC yeah that's how I'm understanding it Colleen unlike I think how Sue is seeing it it's not somebody committee it would be uh in conjunction with CPC and potentially funded by that so not not a Committee Member or someone that's completely tied to CPC it

would still be a separate entity um but Community preservation funds could be available to assist with this right CPC has an admin position and they put a they put aside the the maximum amount every year for that position and they don't even use half of that so if that position was to be expanded is that potentially what we're saying because there's money already available for that that's not being used so you your hand is still up yeah we probably don't need to get too deep into the Weeds on that particular detail I mean the the concept here is to consider having a full dedicated full-time staff member to oversee affordable housing initiatives funding for that could come as as has been noted from CPA but any other overlap between over affordable housing and and CPC may or may not end up being appropriate or desired thank you all for your feedback um in the interest of time I I think we should um move on to the next item on the agenda um and that would be the prior planning um I think we we covered all the action items in housing um unless you have any other questions about the chapter yeah as as with Transportation I I think I my notes I have a few few notes on things to add add to comments that we don't need to you go over this evening but as for transportation I'll add those to the workbook and encourage everybody else um as you continue to read through this if you have additional

comments uh put them in the workbook and as Elena suggested note note them as new so that it's there's no confusion about what they've already looked at and responded to and what they still need to work on thank you and now we have a new draft section to look at right uh we do yes this is a brand new section um and Sarah you could share your screen and I I'll let Sarah uh walk us through this um we would love your input about what we might have missed what uh maybe doesn't need to be here um yeah thanks Selena thanks Steve this is a pretty brief section that lives at the beginning of the master plan and the intention of this is to summarize all of the prior planning that went into the separate chapters without having those at the beginning of every chapter in a redundant way so we're saying these are all the influences of this plan this is everything grafton's done for the last 20 years so we start with the comprehensive plan and then move into more specific plans and uh I think what would be helpful for feedback on this is if we missed anything or if you think any of the plans are misrepresented or if there are key parts of the plan that we want highlighted in this introduction section so we start with the previous master plan um the 2005 Land Management plan for the ham manent Woods the 2006 South Grafton master plan the 2016 Economic Development self assessment tool 2017 North Grafton Wester Street

report and the 2017 North Grafton Transit Village strategic plan your most recent Municipal vulnerability preparedness plan as well as the most recent open space plan and the 2020 Community preservation plan and your local rapid recovery planning program from covid the most recent Hazard mitigation plan and the most recent housing production plan so this is in the same folder as the chapter drafts um if you'd like to take a look you yes Sarah I'll just say good job I think this um hit hit the the key ones you know we obviously need to have at at the very least housing production plan Hazard mitigation um MVP housing uh sorry yeah open space and wreck um and then any Economic Development studies and I think you hit all those and then some I would say there was the only thing I'm just looking at the studies and reports page on the planning website just to do a quick confirmation there's nothing left I don't know if this is getting too specific for the section but the bicycle and pedestrian plan might might need a shout out here um that was probably our biggest Transportation related townwide Transportation analysis in recent years other than kind of our complete streets prioritization plan which that is just essentially a list of projects that the town needs to do it's not really like a a a plan like what we're trying to out wine here um yeah I think you know other than that and and we don't and I I don't

necessarily know if that has to if that bike plan has to live here or if it's just more appropriate to reference in the transportation chapor but um that was the only thing that I um I could I could see and I think he did a good job summarizing the key points for each win thank you yeah I think it would be super appropriate that Bob Carol is up hi yes um so I'm trying to follow along here and where what's the placement for this where where would this be um as far as Which chapter this would be uh before all the chapters in introduction okay so it would be um we'll kind of summarize it in the beginning as you know this these plans you know influence all the chapters of the master plan rather than housing this under a specific chapter I don't know what other folks Impressions um on this are but um do you think this belongs at the very beginning or is it like way too much detail and would we lose the readers having this at the beginning as a summary so I first looked at I thought it was like a executive overview right but then I I see all the the background and all this history which is good I mean I think it belongs in here I'm just questioning whether it belongs at the very beginning we we've done it both ways um in the non- chapter elements we placed it at the end but we

still haven't established where it goes so uh we we can certainly play said at the end of the document okay so it's still still open item yeah yeah it you know I don't know that it should be in the appendix I think it's still kind of a standalone section might be appropriate but we'll definitely defer to you if you think it um we can certainly place it at the end okay so for the time being we'll just go through the um the narratives and the content right right and if you think something does not belong there um you know Fiona told us about one addition but we're you know open to making more additions to this okay gotcha be your hand is up uh yeah thanks safe so I think to B you know to Bob's point I think maybe we I I I respectfully disagree in that I think it it sets the tone for the rest of the document by introducing um how you know all of these prior planning efforts that Grafton has done and basically how they have informed this plan but I do agree with Bob and that maybe we can shorten this so that it's we're not as he said you know kind of maybe like losing the reader losing the reader more or less I think you know maybe shortened like these are the plans that we've looked at um and the data from these plans and recommendations helped inform major decision-making for this for this Master Plan update and kind of maybe do it that way I don't want to I you know this is a working groups document but I'm just trying to think of something that might strike a good balance between

that yeah we could yeah I mean I I guess I'm not super concerned about um losing the reader in this kind of a document where it's going to have a table of contents and people are really going to be flipping to the sections that are of the most interest to them so you know I I feel like people who are interested in the detail are going to want the opportunity to see it and the people who are not or going to flip to the section that is of Interest I mean I don't I I don't know how realistic it is to expect that um many readers are going to read this cover to cover you know I I I hope that doesn't sound as cynical as I feel like it sounded but I think just like the reality is this is really more of a reference document right so if I'm interested in what influenced the document it's in as long as it's findable in the te table of contents you know it's really not to me whether it's in an appendix or a table of contents but I I feel like losing the reader is probably one of my least concerns just due to the nature of the the document so I don't I don't know how much I would stress over it if that makes sense yeah for my from my perspective I'm not too worried about right now deciding exactly where this should go U my my sort of first impression is that this this could easily be an appendix but I really haven't made up my mind I think it sort of you know once we kind

of get get it closer to completion we'll we'll we'll be taking more of a look at it from a readability perspective and organizational perspective I think we've got we've got kind of at least an approximate idea of the flow of the document throughout now this is one piece that could fit pretty well in more than one place but let's let's give it some more thought and uh sooner or later we'll have to decide on the correct placement for it but I wouldn't obsess over it right now the more important one is have we included everything in here that needs to be here and is there anything that doesn't really need to be here the when I looked at the prior plans and studies the you and already pointed out the one that I thought might might be useful here and that's the bike study well bike and whatever pedestrian and bicycle but nothing else when I when I looked at all the past studies nothing else struck me as something it really needed to be here so with all that said is there any other anything else on the on the prior planning summaries if not uh we're about at the end of the meeting tonight what's next so we made some minor edits to the non- chapter elements that you've seen last time um some change in graphics primarily so so I don't know that especially since the meeting is running late maybe we don't need to look at it but it's completely up to

you Elena the only thing I think it looks great um I reviewed it in advance I don't know if other folks had the opportunity to do so one thing that I will say there was a couple of pictures that look a bit pixelly um the specific on I can't um can't remember off the top of my head and might have 70 tabs open and I'm scared to mess with it so but there is a couple and you'll know them when you see them I think that they're they're kind of more in the middle there's only one or two but the rest you know I think it looks great did a good job thank you we'll we'll keep working on it um one section we cons we're considering adding is um collecting all the goals of each chapter it kind of expands the non- chapter elements uh but it's a nice reference to have so we may may add that if you and you can take a look and see if you want to keep it or eliminate it um we'll have a table of contents for the entire plan but sometimes it's nice for the reader to see all the goals in one place yeah I'd agree with that I think the goals up front always help orientate people great so that with that that's uh that's what we have for today thank you all right let's see on our agenda so our next meeting will be February 3r right so we'll look forward to having additional updated chapter drafts to review at that

meeting and uh and the next thing on our agenda is public input do we have any anything I don't see any Zoom attendees so I can't ask for public input from other meeting attendees if if any of us has anything that qualifies as public input as opposed to what was on our agenda now would be the time otherwise a motion to adjourn would be in order so moved second moved and seconded that this meeting be adjourned we'll take a roll call vote Mr Carol Carol's I miss Duckworth hi Miss Fox hi Miss Foley fley I Mr hul hi Miss Kimbo I Mr Robbins th i m Robbins hi Miss r hi motion carried unanimously we were we are adjourned