Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay, good evening everybody. This is the August 6th, 2026 meeting of the Summerfall Planning Board at 6.01 PM. I'm Mike Capuano. I'm the Chairman of the Planning Board. With me tonight is our Vice Chair Amelia Aboff and our Members Coralie Cooper and Luke Schuster, we have four members of the planning board present tonight. We have a quorum pursuant to chapter two of the acts of 2025. This meeting with the planning board is being conducted via remote participation. A video recording of the proceedings will be available on the city's website's meetings and events page or by emailing planningbo

The agenda item is continued. We also have a new case, 6 Wheatland Street, which has requested to be continued to August 20th. Um, Jim moves, continue that agenda item actually, you know, what do we need to read that into the into the record? Can we open it on the 20th person to there? You can open it on the 20th. Okay, let's do that. Then Jim, which continues 6 week on the street to August 20th. 2nd, by Amelia roll call, please.

Michael I, the agenda items continued. We will hear, but when taking agenda items out of order, as is the discretion of the chair, we will take up 32 to 40 white street, which has been. Um. before this board a number of times for different reasons over the last couple of weeks. We also have two matters of other business. One is a discussion of potential adoption of the Arts and Innovation District Urban Design Framework, which is something the Planning Board had a joint meeting on with the Urban Design Commission a few weeks ago. And so Sarah Lewis will be here to talk to us about the changes

Does anybody have any comments or questions of Sarah, any discussion points that they would like to raise about this framework that we were entertaining for a little while? Okay. Thank you, Sarah, very much. The role of the planning board as it relates to that document is to vote on approval. Is that right?

Okay. Seeing no further discussion by members of the planning board, I want to thank you for all the hard work that you put into this and putting us together with UDC. And that was fun. Nice folks. And hopefully we can get this to the next step. for your department. So chair moves to adopt the framework as proposed and amended. Second by Amelia. Roll call, please.

Okay. The next one I'm going to take up is 32 Webster design recommendations. So who is the case planner on that one? And can we make it? Can we have a little on what the design is that you all thought was the best.

Yeah, the really... cool balcony points out front that I think we all thought was an interesting architectural feature. So does anybody have any comments, questions, concerns about the design option that staff has proposed?

I like that one too. Oh, you took it away. It was so pretty. Chair moves to adopt option five as satisfactory of the condition that was imposed when we initially approved the application, seconded by Amelia. Roll call vote, please. Luke Schuster?

We have a design. Okay, last one up. Oh, you know what? I actually completely forgot to do meeting minutes. Let's do that real fast. June 18, 2026. Anybody have any comments, questions, revisions? Okay. Jambu is to adopt June 18, 2026 draft meeting minutes as the final meeting minutes, seconded by Amelia. We'll call it.

Amelia was muted. Michael Kaplan. We have meeting minutes. I was going to say, Amelia, you're not going to throw off that meeting minutes.

The second time your microphone caused a massive issue. Awesome. Let's bring up 32 White Street folks.

We have Philip Seymour and David Swanson. I'm just hoping you guys can all just introduce yourselves one more time for the record before we get into kind of where we're at this evening. Okay.

Let's do this. Let's do this. Planning board is going to be in recess until 620. Perfect. Okay, so we don't just sit here looking at each other. Nobody wants to look at me longer than they have to.

See you all in five minutes. Hey, everybody. Let's just wait until the board is reconstituted after the brief recess. Then we can go back on the record. Just waiting for Luke so we can reconstitute quorum. Okay, at 621, the planning board is back in session. Um, my cap you want to channel planning board, uh, the vice chair of the planning board. We also have our members, Carly Cooper and Luke Schuster. We have reconstituted with quorum. and we are taking up the last agenda item that we have this evening which is 32 to 40 white street uh the applicant has come back to us with some uh proposed r

Thank you. Let's talk about where... where we've come from the last time we had a chance to speak.

So, okay. As it sits, I'm currently calling in from a 1300 square foot three bedroom house. So I think the, Assertion that that's not something that's, you know, a sizable or desirable thing is not exactly akin to my experience. Part one. Part two, what I don't want is to foreclose all opportunities for you to be able to make something work. What I would be willing to entertain if my board members agree is to continue this for another couple of weeks so that you might be able to explore other options through different divisions within the city to try to figure out where some of the relief that

I think I might be the board member most willing to compromise on this item in light of a slightly closer understanding of sort of the marketability and the forces at play there. And I just want to bring you the lens that as the person who I think is perhaps most closely aligned with you, I do take issue a little bit with your idea that this is like new information coming to you and that this is a surprise because I pride myself on trying to stick to sort of the letter of the law of the ordinance. And what I'm seeing is you are in an MR4. You are applying for a special permit for an all-reside

um more larger housing size units like we're talking about the three bedroom units and i i don't mean to penalize i just i i and i'm here with mike saying let's work towards a creative solution and see because i think we all want to see housing get built and it's not this board's intention to uh you know stand in the way of that arbitrarily um but i just wanted to clarify that it's not completely out of the blue that this is coming up so thank you for understanding

I will say as the lawyer on the board, always high on, especially when it comes to municipal boards. We are all amenable to arguments by counsel who know how we operate and understand the regulations and the ordinances thoroughly. I do see that Alvaro's got his hand raised. So what's up? What's up, my friend?

thank you alvaro that's also uh very meaningful information thank you i'd also say even if the board had the the discretion to be able to waive certain inclusionary um requirements i i would i would be deeply surprised if the if the board currently constituted would entertain something like that um but just just keep that keep that in mind i see uh lucent who was raised before

My suggestion remains that in the next couple of weeks, maybe you speak with zoning attorney on what options might look like for you in order to get some sort of a permittable and approvable project. They may be able to provide some guidance that I, as the Chairman of the Planning Board, can't give and it's not our role to give necessarily.

Okay. So let's kick this to the 20th then and see where we're landing. Chair moves to continue this agenda item to August 20th, seconded by Amelia. Roll call, please. Luke Schuster.

Okay. See you in a couple of weeks. And if you need more time, if you know you're going to need more time, talk to Alvaro and we can work on it as need be.

No other business before the planning board at 645 PM. The chair moves to up Carly.

Can I stop you? We're not discussing this particular agenda item right now that's been continued.

And I know that, you know. I think that is coming our way in the near future.

Okay. Chair moves to adjourn at 646, seconded by Amelia Wilcox.