October 14, 2026 – Housing Partnership – Video & Transcript
October 14, 2026 - Housing Partnership
So anyway, we'll get started and it's what, about two minutes after? One minute after. One minute after. Obviously no public comment. We have the minutes from the last meeting and Jim and Rachel both sent in a lot of comments and I don't know if you looked at
At the minutes themselves and their comments, if you have anything other than what they said. If not, I would move that we accept the minutes as amended by Rachel and myself. Seconded. Linda Taper? Aye. So updates. Rachel, as they say, is not going to be here. She did send an email.
There has been no update at Good Shepherd, and we'll hope that we can learn to spell it correctly. The housing production plan, is there any update? I haven't heard anything about, you know, they need to set a calendar, and I haven't heard a thing yet. I was hoping that we would have heard something from Robert Hummel today.
Well, I know that Susan Weinstein is the housing authority appointee to the committee. Okay. And at the housing trust meeting, Jackie volunteered to be on the committee. Excellent. Apparently I am as well.
Okay. Apparently. That's what I hear through the grapevine. That I got volunteered. Wow, that's good. That's great. Congratulations. It's going to be Eli, and I'm going to embarrass myself by forgetting his last name, but he's a professional urban planner. So, you know, we're going to pass that. So,
Robin, were you appointed by the planning? I have no idea. I just hear rumors. Jean, you're appointed by us? Yes. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to guess that you're from planning. Yeah. We have a very strong housing advocate committee. That's great. We've got Jackie. Jim.
You get Jackie too. She's the housing trust. Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you so much. Congratulations. And you'll just have to let the minority members or whatever members of us are left know what's happening. And 212? You know, the request for proposal is out with a deadline in mid-November, so it's going to be another month.
At the housing trust meeting, Chris Reynolds is now the select board member. The bylaws for the trust require a...
A select ward member, not just a liaison member. And it's nice to have somebody who's going to show up again because Ann Brimsley was our previous one and we didn't see much of her. But anyway, he talked about the 212 and the ones.
wants to talk to people to find out because they're trying to balance having the maximum number of beds and what the neighbors are willing to accept because they have, he has several other parcels of land where they're light.
The interest in doing more. Well, I don't think that all of these that where he knows of people who have property, I don't think they're all in Wayland. But some are. But some are. And of course, the local property that the Warner had is still in the works.
Yeah, I think they're on the agenda for our meeting next week. Would it be helpful to have people there? No, so the issue is that they've been having trouble getting their partner to sign a contract. And without the contract, they don't qualify for Dover.
And they don't know if they need to qualify under Dover, but they're trying to get their partner, the people who are going to run it, to sign a contract. And until they do, they just don't know what the rules will be for having their project approved. And we don't know. So the last time they were before us, the partner had not.
Been willing to sign a contract, but they were negotiating and they felt like they could close. So they were hoping that by tomorrow's meeting, next week's meeting, sorry, that they will have...
Progress on getting the contract signed so that then the application can go forward. This is a financial partner? Yeah, so they will run the house. Oh, okay. He's, you know, building it, they're going to run it, they're going to operate it. Okay. It was ARC or something. It was ARC was the one they were talking to, but I think ARC did not sign the contract. Okay. There was some issue between the two. And it's now officially Hobbs Road? Yeah. Well, that's the name on the application.
So, yeah. I see.
And then my understanding is that Hobbs is adjacent there and that they will come in that curb cut rather than off over. Is it H-O-B-B-S? Yeah, H-O-B-B-S. So they have a driveway on both. The upper one is where they'll have a little parking lot and the lower one is where they have access to their garage so they can park their van under there. So they have driveways on both.
And that's been an issue because it's all wooded on that corner and so you can't really see the cars coming, so that was a big deal. But they're going to take care of that. That's not an issue anymore.
The real thing holding it up is them having a contract with ARC or whoever they'll partner with in the end. Now, I've noticed Tyvek or something on the outside. Has that been there for a while? I think it was there when we toured the site. They just tried to protect what's there. That time you had a fire at one. I think so. That was a while ago. They're going to tear the whole thing down. They're not keeping it. There is plastic. There's no structural integrity to that building.
Well, all good things. One more thought on 212. As we move forward in thinking about the housing production plan, we're going to have to dig into some new zoning ideas. You know, for years now, I've watched various groups in town trying to identify land that could be...
developed for other kinds of housing, and the RAP committee looked at every single lot in the entire town and documented everything, and if we're ever going to try some things like the ecological cluster housing, where we get higher density,
And more preservation of open space. It's going to require that we wade into zoning. And I think, you know, the neighbors here at 212 are, you know, clinging to the existing zoning. And it's like, the town has obligations to me for housing. And there isn't any place for us to act.
You know, unless some zoning gets changed, or then somehow we've got to convince a community that if they really want to buy into the objectives of providing housing for people in certain life phases and conditions, I don't think we can treat zoning as a sacred cow. Well, isn't that one reason we want to associate it with our friends at the county board, is to have some role in
In the bylaws? It is, but they still have to go through town meeting. No, no, I understand. But to the extent we could be seen as friends and not foes. Oh, yeah. No, definitely. That's true. But it's still a town meeting issue to me.
Well, isn't there a ballot question? At least one ballot question on its own. It's question seven, and we'll get to that on our agenda. Okay, I'm sorry. Yeah, you know what? I opened it up, and I didn't look at it. I'm focused on taking the minutes. That's multitasking, which I should do. I don't know if anybody has any other updates on...
ADU-related things. I don't this time. Did anything come up with the festival?
Oh, sure. Yeah, no, that was great, and thanks to Jim for toughing it out with me. You know, I give more credit to Roger, who was right next door or nearby with his portable organ, attracting people. With that house, that wooden house, a house with furniture, a dollhouse, which attracted a lot of people with kids.
And then your son, Adam, who was nice enough to be there much of the day, and there were two printouts that you had, and a lot of people signed up with an interest in attending meetings for the housing production. So I think it was cool. I don't know the exact number, but I'd say we probably have 15 or 16 people signed up.
And give us their email indicating that they would like to be invited to participate in focus groups or public meetings. And that's what I was hoping for, you know, that we start getting the story of the town's commitment to planning born on people's tongues and shared in the community.
How many people do you think are signing? I think 15 or 16. I'm going to send the list to Robert, and I'll copy you, Mary. And Robert stopped by. That was helpful. Yeah. But a lot of people just came up and read the posters, which were just straightforward. This is a housing production plan. This is why the TAM does it. It's coming.
Public input is desired and valued. Key messages. Anyway, so we'll see if we get any action out of it. Well, that was a great idea and a wonderful follow-through and thank you.
Thanks, Jean. I just had a little window dressing. Well, it's a long day, and I'm sure she was happy to have some company. Oh, yeah, I was. I was. Was it a busy day there? Well-attended? It was a well-attended event. Wow. If they had...
How about 150 registered participants? The tables that were, or spaces that were allocated. The parade was good. The parade was so cute. Many more people this year. Behind the hardware store, that whole area had like bouncy things. Those inflatable bouncy castles and stuff. And just the whole.
Stroller Patrol was out there with little kids leaping around. There's a lot of music in the morning. Chris Reynolds, you know, introduced people and there was a band from high school, Mr. Ole Miss Sush. When I walked by the bandstand, they had some of the colonial...
Oh yeah. Re-enactors. Re-enactors. And they shot off their muskets without warning the kids in the bandstand. And the kids in the bandstand were facing away from them. And all of a sudden the guns went off and they were, they just yelled, could you warn us next time? So, and I almost had a heart attack too. There was no warning on, they just shot off their muskets, like six of them at a time. It was really...
One of my nieces whose daughter lives in Arizona and she is homeschooling her kids because of the guns in the schools. It's so sad. It's crazy. It's just awful. For a while we lived in a part of the country in the Midwest where a lot of people
Had drove pickup trucks with one or more rifles across the gun rack in the back of the cab. And you just had to get used to it and pay attention. You know, you're in a parking lot next to somebody who's got a gun in their car. You know, you just try to not interact unnecessarily. It's a hard environment. A little questionnaireing is...
Gun control. Pardon me? Gun control. Right. And be careful how you answer it because it is tricky. And I believe it's yes on nine. Yeah, I think it's yes meaning you oppose repealing the gun control regulation. The next is your article.
And it came later today. I didn't get through it all. But the floor is yours.
The idea is, this is a public education as we move forward the housing production plan. How do you get the public's attention? I would say the vast majority of people don't know that there's a strategic body that moves at housing in town, this body, and don't know that there's a housing production plan written and submitted to the Commonwealth every five years. So I'm hoping to...
Write a series of articles over time to kind of bring the public along on awareness over the next several months to get people to pay attention to the fact that a lot of effort goes into planning and that when we come to town meeting with an article about changing something related to housing or asking for funding or asking for land that there's been.
The systematic, orderly cooperative effort made to get there.
So, you know, if you have comments, if you could just, you know, fact check and make sure I'm not telling any lies. Rachel had a few things and I can do a couple of things. Thank you. Basically, Mary, did you send this out? I sent it out for instruction.
Basically, she thought it was very good, but very long. And I guess my question is how you have an in with the post. And the reason I ask is that the 250th committee has had trouble getting the post to print things that...
We want in there. Right. And, you know, I don't know about having any time in. They rejected the previous version of this. And so I've changed it substantially in hopes that it would, you know, be something they'd like, and I'll try it. And if they don't like it, I mean, I can certainly shorten it. That's not a problem. But, and if they don't like it again, I guess...
A strategy would be to write a letter to the editor and say, you know, try to get the core message. Those are only like 250 words, but try to get through some core message about housing planning, the serious process in which the public is, you know, asked to participate so that we understand their thoughts.
Was at our meeting of the trust. And he apparently has been in conversation with Dave Watkins about Dave's property. And so maybe he'll be a little more sympathetic. Maybe what? Maybe he will be a little more sympathetic to having housing stuff in the paper.
I hope so. I mean, his project is a big one. He should be interested. Yeah, I want to talk to the Housing Production Plan Steering Committee, whatever it may call, about, because that's, I've been trying to figure out, but more ideally, some.
Call to produce solid housing over the next decade. You know, how many housing units would a town this size and this character, you know, need to produce, you know, everybody has to produce something across 400-something towns in order to hit the call and looking at us producing between 300 and 400 units over the next decade. Yeah, I know.
It's going to require strategy and planning and serious intent. Has he come before the planning board? No. I know that he and Robert have had discussions. I would think that you might want to talk to Robert about making contact with him and seeing if he'll discuss.
If there's something they don't like about the article, what is it? Is it just the length of it? Are they looking for a balanced approach? Is there something else that they're looking for? And Robert might be able to help with that. Robert seems to be on good terms with him. No, we sort of steered clear of him because we were trying to help out, too.
You know, ease things so that that site is more likely to get built, because the way that it was done ahead of time, it was unlikely to get financed. And he needed a little flexibility in order to be able to get financing. And that's the problem with some of these projects, that if it's zoned in such a way and limited in such a way that they can't get financing, then nobody can build it. Bless you. Thank you. Bless you.
We had a lot of opposition to doing that at town meeting. So, but part of that might be because of Dave himself. Well, I think part of the problem was that I thought Bill Sterling's suggestion was a very good one, and that was, I thought it was sort of a process issue in terms of design and, you know, setback.
Things that would yield a building that's more pleasing. And I think that got lost in the vote, and I think that...
A lot of the opposition, or most of the opposition, was based on that rather than the concept of having... Yeah, but so the design aspect, if we can do through regulations, which are very nimble, we can change them whenever we want to change them. I understand. But until the biologue had changed to allow the extra height to make it the same as Alta-Oxpo or whatever, that project now, the financing just wasn't going to happen. He just wasn't going to be able to get the financing.
But the design aspect of it is something that can be handled in any number of different ways. Have you talked at all about the unit design? My hope is that that project will be flat, one-floor apartments with an elevator. Yeah, my understanding is that it's apartments. Good. I really think that that's the type of housing we need. Well, and it really has to be because the only way...
In a building that size, the only way to make it financeable is to have it be enough units, and that means they have to be stacked, not townhouses. So, I mean, like all dogs, though.
On a smaller site, you know, the building that's over by, between Jendu and the temple, you know, that's a much smaller site, and for that site, townhouses were great. Yeah, that's 12 units. Yeah, but it's a very small site, yeah. So on a small site, townhouses are a great option, but on a larger site, you never get financing for that. That's probably one of the problems with Cascade.
They're stuck between a rock and a hard place. They're stuck between a rock and a string. Yeah, well, you know, but they should recognize that. It's been a problem since the beginning.
If they did townhouses and just made them high-end townhouses, which is not what we're here advocating for, but it's what he'd be able to get financing for and then be able to sell, and it's what he could build on that site. That site was never going to support, because of the stream, it was never going to support a big building. Right, it was crazy to try and put in their rooms.
Wasteboards or something like that. But they would not. You know, they paid too much for the land. And I don't know why. I don't know why. It's in the third owner. I don't know why one of the two owners didn't get stiffed. You know, they should have made them take big haircuts each time. And, you know, now they'd be in a million dollars for the land and not three million or whatever.
And even the plan to put a parking garage underneath that building, which was the original plan. A parking garage would have been a swimming pool part of the year. Yeah, it was crazy. It was the same when they wanted to put apartments over here where terrain is now. They wanted to put a big, multi-floor parking garage underneath. It was like, that's just going to be a really deep swimming pool. Right, and that was going to be five stories. And terrain, they've got a nice design, they've got people coming. It would be exciting to have something like that. Yeah.
at the Cascade site and to have some housing. You don't need 60 units. You can have a comfortable number of units. You could have some high-end and some modest. It doesn't have to all be 10 houses. It could be some, you know, who knows? Anyway. Jean also pointed out that the apartment complex on Commonwealth.
Had applied to become a condo. This is the one next to the Goddard School? Yes. Huh. And so I listened to their meeting and it was very short because they have withdrawn their application. Oh. So we'll see what happens. Okay. So you think they're having second thoughts or?
They didn't say why they were asking to be withdrawn without purchase. By the way, in terms of Cascade, I reached out to Tom Fay, suggested that, because I had written a letter, in response to the letter from Brian O'Hurley. And I wrote a letter, I think, to the Board of Select.
Select Persons and said, you know, this is a bad design. You know, oh, it was to the CONCOM. They should stand their ground. They have reasons to object. They should not waive that even if they're getting pressure from the state. We can work out a better arrangement. We stand ready to help them mediate whatever. And they said, oh, the Board of Select is dealing with them directly. But, you know, I think one of our roles here is to facilitate
We have difficult conversations about different developments where there are important pieces of land or even less important pieces of land. We have a lot of expertise on this board. We know a lot of things. We know people. We should offer ourselves as a free sounding board and a free place for people to come and bring.
And we have a mediator. Well, I'm a mediator, but we, you know, when I look back at it, we mediated some cell tower disputes that were pretty ugly. We did a lot at the zoning board in terms of working with friendly 40Bs and we, with unfriendly 40Bs, at the zoning board, we encouraged people.
To communicate with them to discuss things. Cascade has been just languishing. We need the revenue. We need the site to be cleaned up. But, you know, the owner's not going to do anything. You know, I don't know if at one point Chickamee was thinking of buying it to add to the camp. I mean, there are dozens of different uses for that site. And it's...
If somebody has to go bankrupt, they made some bad financial decisions. If they can't get financing, you know, I have the power to pull the plug, but I'm concerned the town could sue them. I'm not a real estate lawyer, but I think if we could have some sway and help to get a conversation going.
That would be great. I just don't know what to do. If anybody has any ideas, feel free to let me know. Is anything happening with the School Street property? That's a good question. I don't know that either, and I couldn't check in on that. I don't know that. I don't know that there's anything happening. Nothing with us, anyway. Is it still on appeal, or is the appeal process done? It's never been before the board as long as I've been on the board, so...
Now, they were, the appeal was, it was a state wetlands appeal, the riverfront, I think, and it was, it was at CONCOM and then it went up to the, is it the DEP, I think. But it's never come back to planning, so I don't think anything's ever happened to, because otherwise it would have come back to.
Is there a point person in town that would know him? Robert. Robert? Yeah. Why don't I talk to Robert about both of them? Mary, the point you just made about the Commonwealth. I'm sorry, the Commonwealth.
Apartments, Units. Oh, is that the name of the mark? Common Wealth Residence. Yeah, but when you said there was a consideration of going condo, they're all apartments at this point, right? Yeah, that's the way they were built. I think it's 50 or something. There were notifications for a 40B, correct? Yes. Oh, it was, I believe it was. Yeah, but it was 25% affordable.
Well, that's one of the issues that we would lose. I think a number of units would change. Well, enough units to really matter, to knock us below the 10%. We're kind of hanging on by our fingernails right now.
Retracted their application. So the next thing is the email from Darren. I sent it to you and so we should look at over, see what follow-up.
If anything, it could be that, you know, yes, we understand this, but you, you know, one person saying you could suggest that people might have a bigger septic system, even though it's unlikely that anybody's going to take you up on that.
Any particular discussion of this and where we should go with it? I guess I just don't see having to alter and replace the septic system as a huge barrier to building an ADU for other people. I mean, if you look at it as percent of the cost of doing the project.
I think I can figure that out. You know, we'd like to reduce barriers to production of the units, and I can see mostly the benefits of the fact that you can borrow money, you can build a real estate asset, and then you can get a tenant who pays your building loan costs, and at some point, you know, you'd make a lot of money. And I just...
Don't know why the septic issue keeps coming off. Well, it's expensive, but there are also new, I mean, with the new technology, there are ways around it, and I think people should know that if septic is the barrier, do a little exploration. Don't just run away from it and say no. And I don't know anything about septic systems. You know, we've got this system where...
They tie it to bedroom number. You have so many bedrooms and then you have to have so big a tank and you have to have so many yards of leaching field and soil has to perk to a certain level and all that. And we know this in an environment in which there are huge numbers of people in houses. There's two people in a four or five bedroom house who like my house, you know.
You think you've traded accepted credit? Well, you have to wonder. It's a crude measurement tool. It is a crude measurement tool. Bedrooms. And with changes in technology, can we do better? Are people actually being forced to...
Overbuild septic capacity. Well, they are, though, because you could sell your house tomorrow, and a family of eight could come live in your house, and then they need the capacity. So it's a crude measurement, and there is technology, but not always accepted by the town.
But the technology is based on how many people could live in your house, not how many people do live in your house. The fact that you only have two people in your house means your septic system should last longer. But if your house could house eight people instead of two, the system has to be able to handle that. But on the other hand, there are new systems. I remember the School Street property. Recall, they had...
They had a septic engineer. And the problem was the river. But if it were not for that, that would have probably had a septic system that was a very unusual system, didn't go deep enough. I think that was what the issue was with depth. So I know that there are different technical fixes that can...
I think our suggestion or role should be, look, if there's a cost issue, come and talk to, you know, brainstorm with us or with some septic or...
You know, other experts who know what the options are because there are ways to do this in a cost-effective manner. But is this controlled by Title V in the state law as opposed to the town, even if the town was willing to say... Right, but Title V, I think, is looser than the town. That's my understanding. And so, I mean, there are people who deal with Title V law around the state.
Yeah, I mean, like, we're all comfortable with the idea of a water flow into a building being metered. You pay the metering. Sewage is just an outflow. It could have a meter on it. Yeah, but the town can't tell you that you can't sell your house to a family that will have eight people living in your house because your meter can't handle it.
Well, no, I mean, you'd have to put in a meter that would measure actual flows. Right, but if your septic can't handle more than two people in your house, then they'd have to tell you you can't sell your house to a family of more than two people. Well, I think maybe there's some ways to work around that if you redefine capacity.
Think about it in a different way. Right now, we're doing this very crude measure of number of bedrooms. Okay, if somebody's got eight people in their family, should they have seven bedrooms, six bedrooms? How many bathrooms? Some of this has got so much slop in the measurement system.
Isn't there a difference in septic regulations if it's over 55? That's my memory is when we did the old Oxbow property. If it's a 55 and older community, the number of gallons per day, whatever, is drastically different than if it's not age-related.
Again, I know so little about this. Which way does it go, though? But I know that there are ways around this. There are... It's not just linear. We met with Robert, and we met with McCall.
The Building Commissioner and all, with the idea of, if you remember, getting credit for the non, the empty nesters, basically, at least during the period, and they basically blew it out of the water, because not being a something that was viable. Something that they couldn't fathom considering the impact at the time. I mean, I was sort of coming, and it's from the same direction then.
There are a lot of people who are in a position of empty nesting, but there is still an issue constantly of setting, residing, and what are we doing? Unless you're going to deed restrict somebody's house, and that's not something the town has the power to do. They can't force a deed restriction so that there can't be more than a certain number of people living in a house. And just a straight age thing, an empty nesting thing, it is not that straightforward.
I'm home all day every day. I work at my office. Right. So, you know, that's a huge thing. There are people with eight people living in the house and nobody's there all day. So, you know, it's just way too complex. And while there is some new technology coming and that may change things if the town accepts that.
The technology of metering is not going to be something that changes anything. It's still going to be based on bedrooms. And you can change the number of bedrooms in your house. You can remove closets. And you are free to do that and then have it not counted as a bedroom. But the problem with that is then when you go to sell your house, people are going to be like, wait a minute, this giant house only has two bedrooms? How does that?
So, and then the people who move into your house will end up blowing through their septic system. Well, I'll drop the subject for the moment, but I think there's more to talk about there, and I appreciate it's a statewide issue.
Well, and it's not statewide because there aren't that many towns in the state that have septic systems. It is sort of a local issue because for towns that have septic, it becomes very local. There aren't that many towns that have septic anymore. It sounds to me like there are still questions, and so I wonder whether we should invite...
Darren to come or whether it would be more convenient for him to have maybe two people go meet with him and ask these kinds of questions. I also remember having had a conversation, a very brief conversation with Bill Sterling.
Where he said that there are other ways of determining the status of the septic other than bedrooms. And so maybe a conversation with him. Should we invite Darren or Julia? I think that would be very helpful.
I'm happy to talk to them. I think, for me, the greater question is, how do we create an environment in which people are motivated to build and stuff we're going in? It's a different question. I mean, there are these websites that are popping up where you can put in your street address, and they go to the public record, and they pull up the...
Schematics of your lot, and they tell you, you know, between the back of your house and the setback lines, you have this many square feet that are not sitting on top of your septic tank, and the public's finding their way to those sites are not to ask their initial questions about whether they can fit them on their lot.
I think the cost is a huge issue. It's a huge issue. Especially nearly all the ADUs that I'm aware of that are being built in Wayland I think are being built for family members not to be rented. So these aren't people who are thinking they're going to recruit the cost. These are people who are thinking they're eating the cost. And so any added cost, and that means having to take out your existing septic and add a new resized septic system is a huge cost. Because you're not just adding a little septic system. You have to remove your entire septic system and add one with larger capacity. And so, I mean, if you had a very large lot, maybe you could get permission to put in a separate septic system, but almost all the cases involve removing your whole septic system, which is expensive. And then putting in a whole new one. These mom systems are not any cheaper. No, they're not really. They're slightly cheaper, depending on what your site is like, but it's still very expensive. And if you're not looking at a rental unit, if you're not going to make the money back, because it's really for your parents to live in, or your kids to live in, or your Aunt Susie to live in, you're not going to recoup that. Why can't you add on to a subject system instead of... I think that there is a A reason you can't have two septic systems on one site. Like if you have a house and your septic fails, you can't just, if you have a giant lot, I don't think you're allowed to just put in a new septic system. You have to remove the existing one because I think you're only allowed to have one on the site. And if you had a really big lot, maybe, but I think you might actually have to subdivide a lot in order to put in a second system. And you can't just add infiltrators to an existing system. Or enlarge your tank. I don't think so. Okay. Isn't this regulated under the ATU rigs that address this? No, it's all board health stuff. It's regulated like any other septic system. Well, maybe we ought to have them come in and that would be helpful to, you know, ask them. Well, what about such and such? And I might just say no, or gee, we never thought of that. I mean, the original request to them was would they mind just putting something on there that just says, hey, if you might want to have an ADU, you might consider supersizing your capacity just enough so that you could add another bedroom. And I still think that's a valid thing to ask them to do. Even if they think there are other concerns, granted there are other concerns, but if you've got somebody who's putting in a brand new septic system, it is the time to say to them, hey, just in case you might want to have your in-laws come with you, you could consider this now and it will save you money down the road. The trust has a house at 11 Hammond Road. And we knew we wanted to put a second house on it and the septic system had to be redone or improved or whatever. And we asked that it increase the capacity so that it would cover the second house, which remains to be built. Okay, well, I will ask them to come. They really don't negate this fellow's, Darren's response, Julia's response. Neither of them rejected the idea of the suggestion that was made. They just came up with all these additional concerns or caveats. We just want a sentence. I think the idea of a sentence is something we could support. And I think they would too.
It certainly doesn't hurt to throw that in. Yeah, I think to make that motion and we put that in something that the committee supports and then use that to at least work from. It's not going to be a barrier to doing more, but at least it gets us a step in that direction of opening the thinking, I would think.
So when we meet with them, before we meet with them, if we have a sentence or two sentences that we have worked on together and we agree this is what we need, then while they're here with us, we could have a motion that we are going to ask them to put this sentence on their application forms. And, you know, you want to put a couple sentences? Sure. Thank you.
I'll send it to you first, because you're the big editor. I'm the big editor, and I'm taking the minutes tonight, so that's fine. And I have my office, which has a great Xerox machine, so talk about it a lot more. So in Jean's earlier article, she had copied what was online. That said, among other things, that the partnership was the first line for developers to come to, which is not true anymore. So we need to look at that charge again. And in Rachel's thing, she mentioned that That we have another unfilled position. And again, the charge I think includes that a member of the select board is a member of this, which has never ever happened. And so there are a couple of things related to the charge and the composition. That should be corrected. Get a letter, send it to the town manager and get his feedback to try to correct those two things. We had talked earlier about having a discussion with him on what the partnership.
What we do as we need this committee and we need to have a correct charge and a full membership. And if that membership is going to be a select board member, they need to appoint one. So I think that's a conversation after submitting the letter. To try to get those things corrected. Thoughts about that? Well, let's see. The select board determines the charge? When they set up a committee, they usually do. It doesn't mean that we can't, we could go to them with what we think our charge is. And the one that's online is... This is not the correct charge. So if you just omit that one reference to meeting with developers, is the rest of the charge suitable? As far as I can recollect, it is. I've never looked at the charge, to be honest with you. What? I've never looked at the charge. Okay, maybe we should resolve our agenda for our next meeting. Yeah, why not? Let's review our charge, and that's the select board for the charge we want. I think that's a good idea. And Val, question seven, I think Kathy's looked into that. It doesn't apply to us. I mean, it applies to Wayland only in terms of how...
Generally doesn't apply. It's not that no one's eligible in Wayland. It's just that the eligibility is limited by under 5,000 square feet, 5,000 or less square feet. No matter. It's a long 5,000 square feet development, but you have to be on. Sewage. Sewage. Public sewer. And that's the problem in Wayland where, I believe, I can't remember the number I sent you, when I looked at about 95% or 90% of Wayland is not on public sewer. And it only is. So those places where, I mean, there is eligibility for, it's not like Wayland itself is off the charts. If you're in one of those units or. It's really just the town center. It's only the town center exactly where they are. They're on public sewer. And any units there that were, that could meet this definition of 5,000 square feet, and the 50 foot, I believe, is what it is in terms of frontage, is required. But, you know, 95% of the time it's not. But, again, in Rachel's email, and maybe I should forward that to everybody, because she says another reason to support the article, even though it doesn't apply to us, is because Massachusetts has been in the forefront of tackling local zoning issues. For the MBTA communities in particular, I am in favor of the state intervening to try to promote housing. I think a yes vote is likely to be mostly symbolic, but I am okay with giving the state a nod for their efforts. I mean, again, it's not that Wayland was not eligible. It's just that there's limited eligibility. But the point is, the Globe endorses this question. The New York Times has endorsed Question 7 for Massachusetts, which is interesting. Yes. And, my God, Pioneer Institute is endorsing it. So, I mean, you basically have a lot of bipartisan support. And it is about starter homes and this notion that it's going to make a difference. And I believe the number they're using is 2,200 to 5,000, 5,700 net new homes per year, providing much-needed missing middle housing for residents and young people unable to compete in the market prices. It's not about Focused on low-income housing. It's not about affordability in terms of our concept of affordable housing. But rather than skipping, leaving it blank. Correct. If you believe in housing as a right or as a human right, above this. I'm wondering whether Rachel might write a letter to the editor along that line.
I don't know that it'll get published in time at this point. They're only printing once every two weeks. Well, that's all they can do. But if she could, I mean, we got one, got a paper last Thursday or Friday. November 3rd is balanced. That's your point. Deadline. So we should get one on the floor.
Oh, so the deadline is... Oh, yeah, the voting is November 3rd for the... Yeah, we don't have two weeks. That helps me, though, as far as voting, and I won. Yes, on 7. I was surprised that Logan lost it tonight. Her email includes a link to CHAPA and why they split the articles. I will send this to everybody. Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, So, I understand that you brought some maps, and it's not on the agenda, but we'll pretend it comes up on the agenda. So, Robert gave me maps that show only housing. Zones. There are no overlays on here. There's just the housing one. And then, a copy. This is the first one. This is the, this is a, I think this is a fun one to look at because some of the things are hilarious. The table of permitted uses of the Broadway. There's two more of those. And then also, The setback provisions for each zone. And I find that these two charts, when combined with the map, are helpful. First of all, I think it's helpful to see the map of just the residential zones without the overlays. Overlays make everything confusing because you can't always tell what's the overlay and what's the actual underlying zone. So by taking out the overlays, it's helpful. Some of these, like the red and the pink and the purple are a little close together. Sometimes a little hard to tell, but you can tell where everything is and you can see what's allowed. You can see what you need a special permit for, what you need a, what you have to then look over here to see if it's allowed. But to me, this helps by making it clear. And you can also see, so we have We have four zones that are just different size lots and different amounts of frontage required. So we do have zones down in Conchituate where smaller lots are allowed and then others up above where there are larger lots and then in-betweens and everything like that. So I just thought this was helpful and then once you compare it with these two charts, I think it's a little easier to see. Kind of what goes where. And then looking at what the maximum lot sizes are, lot coverage, which lot coverage is pretty much the same. But the frontages change and then the setbacks are mostly the same, but from the lot lines it does change on the sides, which makes sense. And I didn't know if anybody, I didn't really want to Just sit here and babble about these. But if people had questions, we could talk about them. Sure. Okay. The overarching is why this is, you know, did it develop slowly over time? Was there, you know, some sort of state mandate in 1952 or something? I don't know that that's true because, you know, you look at Kichituit, And that area down south with the smaller lots. And there are some areas over there, some neighborhoods with very old houses. And those were, you know, a lot of the houses that are near the lake were little campsites. And so they were probably really old sites, but people were nestled in there together because they wanted to all have their lake frontage and whatever. And so I think it just developed that way. And I think it's possible that the big lots in the center of town... The big green section. You know, some of those are huge lots, but that has nothing to do with zoning. That just has something to do with people buying up big tracts of land, and a lot of that was farmland. You know, I think about out on Pelham Island, I mean, it was a farm. And, you know, as somebody wanted to make some money, they took a little section of the farm and sold it off. And I'm sure the whole section up along kind of the Sudbury side of town, all the way up from north to south, it's big lots that were farms, and they got sold off in little bits. And sometimes a big section of the farm was kept and sold into just bigger lots. And I think it developed over time that way. But Kichitua was always different, and it's not... That it was developed during a certain period of time. I think it was, you know, people all wanted to have their little camps. They were camps. You know, a lot of those houses, even when I moved to town, some of those houses weren't heated. Certainly around Deadly Ponds. Yeah. And even their houses all along Lake Chichua, too, and they were camps. And they were packed in there in some of the parts, especially around the ponds. So, yeah, it's interesting to look at, you know, you can, just by looking, you can see where the farms were, you can see where there's, oh, there's a big, huge section of land, a big, huge section of land, and some of that is because it's wet, some of it's not, you know, up where I am, up in the north part, we've got where the missile silo was, and that's all open land, you know, with just a few little areas around it, so.
It's interesting. A little historical thing to look at. Yeah, but I think the map is easier to decipher and to just to look at and be like, oh, this is where our housing is. And when you take out all the overlay districts, they're not relevant to housing really. So, I mean, yeah, the wastewater treatment overlay district is because those people have sewer. But, you know, it's interesting with connection with that question seven. In Wayland, I'm not sure that our wastewater treatment, the people who are on the wastewater treatment plant, I don't even know if that qualifies under this question seven because it's not unlimited capacity. You know, we can't just keep adding people to that. So I'm not even sure it would qualify because it's not like a public sewer which is like, anybody's sure? How can you find? Because it is limited. Any other questions? It is interesting. Look at the minimum log of 20,000 being the minimum for Wayland for the single evidence. Yeah. With 120 frontage and this change is question 7 about 5,000. Yeah. So it is a significant change even if you were to do this, but right. Yeah. Big parcels lately you could perhaps. Well, I remember, as a member of the zoning board, I don't know, 80 or 90 percent of the properties we saw were pre-existing non-conforming, either because of lot size or frontage or whatever, but there are so few lots in town that are conforming. And on what measure was it? The frontage in most cases? A lot of cases, the frontage. Sometimes it's the lot size. And it can also be, you know, there were also a lot of places that had sideline. Violations from the old days because, you know, they used to build stuff right on the edges of property. So if it's a 10 or 20 foot sideline, you'd have a shed or something right up against it. So there were just, I mean, historically, it's a lovely community, but the zoning sort of came in and out. So, I don't know how to do this. It would be very interesting to do what-if scenarios where, let's say, we'll just pick the purple part, the 60,000. The big ones. Yeah, the big ones with the 210 frontage. And if you could run what-if scenarios. Looking at where you bend those variables. Let's say one scenario would be to change the whole thing to R40. Just say, okay, we're going to change the whole thing. Everything's going to be that R40 is going to be our biggest. And make it conform to the lesser frontage as well as the lesser area.
What's the likely outcome to be in terms of the appearance of buildable lots? It would depend how many in that 60 square foot zone. How many of the lots are really just 60 square feet? Because if it's just 60 square feet, you can't divide it into two and make 240,000. So if in that purple zone, most of the lots are 80,000 and larger, then there's a chance you might actually be able to subdivide some of them. But if they really are mostly 60 foot lots with a couple of huge lots... It's not going to get you anything because you're not going to be able to subdivide those. You won't be able to make two. Well, you don't have to subdivide them. You could add dwelling units. Yeah, but you can do that now. You can add an ADU now. That doesn't change anything. You can still add an ADU. Well, maybe you could add more ADUs. So that's a problem because you end up... When we were drafting the ADU bylaws, one very tricky piece is that... If you add more than one ADU under certain circumstances, it becomes multifamily housing, and it's not zoned for multifamily housing. I understand, but that's the point. I think part of what Gina is looking at is looking beyond this and saying, what would the impact be? You're absolutely right. We are going to run up against some issues, whether it's multifamily or... Or a lot line size or something. You're talking about the context of an attached unit, for example. That's an ADU, but in the context of changing the minimum lot size, if you take 60 and say, well, now it could be 40, if you got the GIS maps and you discover that nearly all of the lots, let's say a huge majority of the lots in that purple zone, Or actually like 60, 62, then saying it could be 40 doesn't help you unless two neighbors get together and chop off a half each and give it to somebody else. But if you took 60 and said you could have a 30,000 square foot lot, and I'm not sure that would pass in town. But if it passed, then one family could chuck their lot in half and make two lots. But saying you can go from 60 to 40, if let's say 85% of the lots are only 60, 62, 64, it doesn't get you anywhere. But if you go from 60 to 30, then people can actually subdivide their lot and put in a second house, not an ADU, because they can do an ADU now. No, I understand. I'm really talking about mathematical modeling. Right. Where you set the constraints and you've described the situation in which a what-if scenario doesn't yield much outcome. Then you start looking for which what-if scenario does yield an outcome. I thought about this quite a bit. I find myself leaning very much toward trying to come up with some zones that are a new classification of cluster. And the hard thing here is we have so little big pieces of land to work with. We've got that one piece that, you know, it was the part of what town meeting about, where there's enough acreage that you could... potentially have little cottages on 5,000 square foot lots and create an eco-village with a big swath of land to put into conservation around it. Yeah, we do have things that allow for a conservation cluster already. Yeah, and I'm familiar with that. To think about something different is that that doesn't really, the increased density allowed is so small. And that when you need as many units as we probably need in small housing, then we need something different. Because you can't get builders to build these units unless they're as profitable as alternate activities. So you have to give them a density that they can do their spreadsheet and say, oh, well, this is as profitable as doing McMansions. So we can do an eco-cluster and make enough money to build the project. And it's not even so much a profitability issue, but it's a getting financing issue. They can't even get to profitability if they can't get financing. And I'm not sure that there's enough land in Wayland that's not wet to do anything like that. Unless you get people as a group, like a whole neighborhood's going to sell their house and their lots all together, a couple of lots together, because there's so little that's unbuilt already in Wayland that's buildable. Well, I'd like to spend more time talking about how could we take areas and make them multifamily, you know, present a multifamily option with an overlay. You know, it's tough because Acton is currently doing these eco-pillages happily because they have a big swath of land. I'm not sure taking 60,000 square foot lots and cutting them into 30,000 square foot lots would end up with anything other than just... Really covering land with lots of asphalt and concrete. And, you know, so it's like, how do we find something where we can increase the housing units densely so that we're leaving the green space, you know, viable habitat? Well, and that's hard, because anything that threatens that seriously is not going to get through town meeting. But... There are a lot of people who are looking for a way financially to stay in town. And becoming a landlord is not necessarily their cup of tea, but subdividing their lot and letting somebody build a lot, a house on the other side of their lot, that's more palatable to a lot of people who want to sort of age in place, who want to stay in town. And maybe they build a new house and move into it and sell the old house. But subdividing... Maybe more palatable to people who don't want to become landlords to an ADU. I live now in the condos next to traditions. 24 units. I was talking with somebody the other day who said that she moved here to live closer to her daughter. She really had a tough time trying to find a place to live. And we both agreed that we need more of that kind of structure. So that's maybe more doable. I mean, I live in the condos on launching. I'm a launching person. Same thing, it's condos because Some of the lots could have been made conforming, but some of the lots could not have. Some of the houses are on little teeny parcels and would never have been even close to conforming. This is not the military. Oh, it is? Okay. And that's 16 units or 12? 12 units. And even as the residents up there discussed decondoizing because it's silly that we're condos. We probably can't because at least two or three of the houses could never be made conforming. They're way undersized lots. Aren't they all undersized? The houses are, but the lots are not. So we have exclusive use areas for each of the houses. But particularly the houses that are on the corner of that little launcher way and Oxbow could never be made conforming and probably... Maybe two of the other units could never be linked in formal. But like my house, I have a huge section that goes way down into the woods behind my house. But some of them are very small. We couldn't gerrymander it into existence. But you know, it's not capitally affordable, but they were, by Wayland standards, affordable. And our units compared to the Mainstone units are substantially expensive. Will you keep these so we can get Rachel a copy? Okay. I'll put it on the next one. Okay. Why don't we get them back to you so you can take care of them all. We don't lose them in the next year. Yeah, sure. Are you giving them all that? If you want to. If you want to keep it, keep it. And if you want to give it back, give it back. Keep mine. Take a little bit. Okay. So it's okay if you keep them? Yes, absolutely. Do you want to keep yours? I'll try to leave it. I can't believe each of them, so I can put them in a minute. So the next thing is to reschedule our meetings. And Wednesday... If you're doing the Wednesdays, you have to avoid my planning for meetings. If you do it Tuesdays... We had all those dates. And you asked if we could do it on a different day. Yeah, if you do it Tuesdays, that would be great, but I'm happy to do them on Wednesdays, whatever you guys like. But we can at least talk about them. Sure. Okay, so let me see. I don't think I have anything regular on evenings. Actually, I have Thursday night theater. You have Thursday night what? Theater. Huntington Theater. So Tuesday and Wednesday, I think, are equal for me. And I'm easy. I have... Very bleak, scheduled other things, and I, you know, just ignore them. And Kathy, either is fine. You know, when you're scheduling with other people. If we move to Tuesday, before we were trying to fit in with the planning board, now we can just say the first Tuesday or the third Tuesday or whatever. Yep. So what are we now? Are we the second? We're on the second Wednesday. So if we move to Tuesday. Second Tuesday? The second Tuesday would be the 10th. In December it would be the 8th. So November 10th, December 8th. So we'll just say the second Tuesday of the month. Do we have them? I don't even know if we plan beyond that. I can take my calendars. Then it's January 12th, February 12th, February 9th, March 9th, April 13th, May 4th, I mean, May 11th, and 15th. Actually, June 8th is the second Tuesday. Thank you. Calendar items. At some point, the town's going to receive all those proposals for 212 Cachitua, and I imagine there'll be a disclosure meeting, like a presentation to the select board or something. We might want to have a scheduled meeting at that time so that we could all be present for the presentation. June 12 is what day? We don't know yet, but sometime after November 15th, they'll have them all, and then I have to believe there'll be a presentation to the select board, and it would just be nice if when that time comes we could announce. A meeting, a coincident meeting, so that we could all be present and say that. So we should schedule a meeting then? Well, I'm just saying, anticipating that we may need additional meetings if we want to be present at those because we're limited and how many of us could go unless we actually publicly declare to a meeting. We can say it'll be the second Tuesday of the month, but... Plus, there may be some additional ones that we declare in order to be able to see these presentations. So this will be where they come up with the final plan? Well, they have to pick, and I don't know what their process is going to be for hearing the... The presentations, whether they're just going to have the town planner show the documents that were submitted, or whether they're going to have the individual organizations come, whether they'll all come at one time, whether they'll come on different evenings, you know, just... I just wanted to suggest that we need to be aware. So these are just reviewing the submittals from the province. Okay. I'm sorry. I didn't quite know what it was. Oh, I'm sorry. This is the minute, so I have to understand more than I normally do. If I just nod and say I know what I'm doing, that may not be the case. Okay. Looks like we're all gearing up to leave. Is this, have we gotten through the agenda? The matter is not reasonable. Anything else? I suggest we adjourn. I move to adjourn. Second. Second. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.
I think the cost is a huge issue. It's a huge issue. Especially nearly all the ADUs that I'm aware of that are being built in Wayland I think are being built for family members not to be rented. So these aren't people who are thinking they're going to recruit the cost. These are people who are thinking they're eating the cost. And so any added cost, and that means having to take out your existing septic and add a new resized septic system is a huge cost. Because you're not just adding a little septic system. You have to remove your entire septic system and add one with larger capacity. And so, I mean, if you had a very large lot, maybe you could get permission to put in a separate septic system, but almost all the cases involve removing your whole septic system, which is expensive. And then putting in a whole new one. These mom systems are not any cheaper. No, they're not really. They're slightly cheaper, depending on what your site is like, but it's still very expensive. And if you're not looking at a rental unit, if you're not going to make the money back, because it's really for your parents to live in, or your kids to live in, or your Aunt Susie to live in, you're not going to recoup that. Why can't you add on to a subject system instead of... I think that there is a A reason you can't have two septic systems on one site. Like if you have a house and your septic fails, you can't just, if you have a giant lot, I don't think you're allowed to just put in a new septic system. You have to remove the existing one because I think you're only allowed to have one on the site. And if you had a really big lot, maybe, but I think you might actually have to subdivide a lot in order to put in a second system. And you can't just add infiltrators to an existing system. Or enlarge your tank. I don't think so. Okay. Isn't this regulated under the ATU rigs that address this? No, it's all board health stuff. It's regulated like any other septic system. Well, maybe we ought to have them come in and that would be helpful to, you know, ask them. Well, what about such and such? And I might just say no, or gee, we never thought of that. I mean, the original request to them was would they mind just putting something on there that just says, hey, if you might want to have an ADU, you might consider supersizing your capacity just enough so that you could add another bedroom. And I still think that's a valid thing to ask them to do. Even if they think there are other concerns, granted there are other concerns, but if you've got somebody who's putting in a brand new septic system, it is the time to say to them, hey, just in case you might want to have your in-laws come with you, you could consider this now and it will save you money down the road. The trust has a house at 11 Hammond Road. And we knew we wanted to put a second house on it and the septic system had to be redone or improved or whatever. And we asked that it increase the capacity so that it would cover the second house, which remains to be built. Okay, well, I will ask them to come. They really don't negate this fellow's, Darren's response, Julia's response. Neither of them rejected the idea of the suggestion that was made. They just came up with all these additional concerns or caveats. We just want a sentence. I think the idea of a sentence is something we could support. And I think they would too.
It certainly doesn't hurt to throw that in. Yeah, I think to make that motion and we put that in something that the committee supports and then use that to at least work from. It's not going to be a barrier to doing more, but at least it gets us a step in that direction of opening the thinking, I would think.
So when we meet with them, before we meet with them, if we have a sentence or two sentences that we have worked on together and we agree this is what we need, then while they're here with us, we could have a motion that we are going to ask them to put this sentence on their application forms. And, you know, you want to put a couple sentences? Sure. Thank you.
I'll send it to you first, because you're the big editor. I'm the big editor, and I'm taking the minutes tonight, so that's fine. And I have my office, which has a great Xerox machine, so talk about it a lot more. So in Jean's earlier article, she had copied what was online. That said, among other things, that the partnership was the first line for developers to come to, which is not true anymore. So we need to look at that charge again. And in Rachel's thing, she mentioned that That we have another unfilled position. And again, the charge I think includes that a member of the select board is a member of this, which has never ever happened. And so there are a couple of things related to the charge and the composition. That should be corrected. Get a letter, send it to the town manager and get his feedback to try to correct those two things. We had talked earlier about having a discussion with him on what the partnership.
What we do as we need this committee and we need to have a correct charge and a full membership. And if that membership is going to be a select board member, they need to appoint one. So I think that's a conversation after submitting the letter. To try to get those things corrected. Thoughts about that? Well, let's see. The select board determines the charge? When they set up a committee, they usually do. It doesn't mean that we can't, we could go to them with what we think our charge is. And the one that's online is... This is not the correct charge. So if you just omit that one reference to meeting with developers, is the rest of the charge suitable? As far as I can recollect, it is. I've never looked at the charge, to be honest with you. What? I've never looked at the charge. Okay, maybe we should resolve our agenda for our next meeting. Yeah, why not? Let's review our charge, and that's the select board for the charge we want. I think that's a good idea. And Val, question seven, I think Kathy's looked into that. It doesn't apply to us. I mean, it applies to Wayland only in terms of how...
Generally doesn't apply. It's not that no one's eligible in Wayland. It's just that the eligibility is limited by under 5,000 square feet, 5,000 or less square feet. No matter. It's a long 5,000 square feet development, but you have to be on. Sewage. Sewage. Public sewer. And that's the problem in Wayland where, I believe, I can't remember the number I sent you, when I looked at about 95% or 90% of Wayland is not on public sewer. And it only is. So those places where, I mean, there is eligibility for, it's not like Wayland itself is off the charts. If you're in one of those units or. It's really just the town center. It's only the town center exactly where they are. They're on public sewer. And any units there that were, that could meet this definition of 5,000 square feet, and the 50 foot, I believe, is what it is in terms of frontage, is required. But, you know, 95% of the time it's not. But, again, in Rachel's email, and maybe I should forward that to everybody, because she says another reason to support the article, even though it doesn't apply to us, is because Massachusetts has been in the forefront of tackling local zoning issues. For the MBTA communities in particular, I am in favor of the state intervening to try to promote housing. I think a yes vote is likely to be mostly symbolic, but I am okay with giving the state a nod for their efforts. I mean, again, it's not that Wayland was not eligible. It's just that there's limited eligibility. But the point is, the Globe endorses this question. The New York Times has endorsed Question 7 for Massachusetts, which is interesting. Yes. And, my God, Pioneer Institute is endorsing it. So, I mean, you basically have a lot of bipartisan support. And it is about starter homes and this notion that it's going to make a difference. And I believe the number they're using is 2,200 to 5,000, 5,700 net new homes per year, providing much-needed missing middle housing for residents and young people unable to compete in the market prices. It's not about Focused on low-income housing. It's not about affordability in terms of our concept of affordable housing. But rather than skipping, leaving it blank. Correct. If you believe in housing as a right or as a human right, above this. I'm wondering whether Rachel might write a letter to the editor along that line.
I don't know that it'll get published in time at this point. They're only printing once every two weeks. Well, that's all they can do. But if she could, I mean, we got one, got a paper last Thursday or Friday. November 3rd is balanced. That's your point. Deadline. So we should get one on the floor.
Oh, so the deadline is... Oh, yeah, the voting is November 3rd for the... Yeah, we don't have two weeks. That helps me, though, as far as voting, and I won. Yes, on 7. I was surprised that Logan lost it tonight. Her email includes a link to CHAPA and why they split the articles. I will send this to everybody. Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, Rachel Bratt, So, I understand that you brought some maps, and it's not on the agenda, but we'll pretend it comes up on the agenda. So, Robert gave me maps that show only housing. Zones. There are no overlays on here. There's just the housing one. And then, a copy. This is the first one. This is the, this is a, I think this is a fun one to look at because some of the things are hilarious. The table of permitted uses of the Broadway. There's two more of those. And then also, The setback provisions for each zone. And I find that these two charts, when combined with the map, are helpful. First of all, I think it's helpful to see the map of just the residential zones without the overlays. Overlays make everything confusing because you can't always tell what's the overlay and what's the actual underlying zone. So by taking out the overlays, it's helpful. Some of these, like the red and the pink and the purple are a little close together. Sometimes a little hard to tell, but you can tell where everything is and you can see what's allowed. You can see what you need a special permit for, what you need a, what you have to then look over here to see if it's allowed. But to me, this helps by making it clear. And you can also see, so we have We have four zones that are just different size lots and different amounts of frontage required. So we do have zones down in Conchituate where smaller lots are allowed and then others up above where there are larger lots and then in-betweens and everything like that. So I just thought this was helpful and then once you compare it with these two charts, I think it's a little easier to see. Kind of what goes where. And then looking at what the maximum lot sizes are, lot coverage, which lot coverage is pretty much the same. But the frontages change and then the setbacks are mostly the same, but from the lot lines it does change on the sides, which makes sense. And I didn't know if anybody, I didn't really want to Just sit here and babble about these. But if people had questions, we could talk about them. Sure. Okay. The overarching is why this is, you know, did it develop slowly over time? Was there, you know, some sort of state mandate in 1952 or something? I don't know that that's true because, you know, you look at Kichituit, And that area down south with the smaller lots. And there are some areas over there, some neighborhoods with very old houses. And those were, you know, a lot of the houses that are near the lake were little campsites. And so they were probably really old sites, but people were nestled in there together because they wanted to all have their lake frontage and whatever. And so I think it just developed that way. And I think it's possible that the big lots in the center of town... The big green section. You know, some of those are huge lots, but that has nothing to do with zoning. That just has something to do with people buying up big tracts of land, and a lot of that was farmland. You know, I think about out on Pelham Island, I mean, it was a farm. And, you know, as somebody wanted to make some money, they took a little section of the farm and sold it off. And I'm sure the whole section up along kind of the Sudbury side of town, all the way up from north to south, it's big lots that were farms, and they got sold off in little bits. And sometimes a big section of the farm was kept and sold into just bigger lots. And I think it developed over time that way. But Kichitua was always different, and it's not... That it was developed during a certain period of time. I think it was, you know, people all wanted to have their little camps. They were camps. You know, a lot of those houses, even when I moved to town, some of those houses weren't heated. Certainly around Deadly Ponds. Yeah. And even their houses all along Lake Chichua, too, and they were camps. And they were packed in there in some of the parts, especially around the ponds. So, yeah, it's interesting to look at, you know, you can, just by looking, you can see where the farms were, you can see where there's, oh, there's a big, huge section of land, a big, huge section of land, and some of that is because it's wet, some of it's not, you know, up where I am, up in the north part, we've got where the missile silo was, and that's all open land, you know, with just a few little areas around it, so.
It's interesting. A little historical thing to look at. Yeah, but I think the map is easier to decipher and to just to look at and be like, oh, this is where our housing is. And when you take out all the overlay districts, they're not relevant to housing really. So, I mean, yeah, the wastewater treatment overlay district is because those people have sewer. But, you know, it's interesting with connection with that question seven. In Wayland, I'm not sure that our wastewater treatment, the people who are on the wastewater treatment plant, I don't even know if that qualifies under this question seven because it's not unlimited capacity. You know, we can't just keep adding people to that. So I'm not even sure it would qualify because it's not like a public sewer which is like, anybody's sure? How can you find? Because it is limited. Any other questions? It is interesting. Look at the minimum log of 20,000 being the minimum for Wayland for the single evidence. Yeah. With 120 frontage and this change is question 7 about 5,000. Yeah. So it is a significant change even if you were to do this, but right. Yeah. Big parcels lately you could perhaps. Well, I remember, as a member of the zoning board, I don't know, 80 or 90 percent of the properties we saw were pre-existing non-conforming, either because of lot size or frontage or whatever, but there are so few lots in town that are conforming. And on what measure was it? The frontage in most cases? A lot of cases, the frontage. Sometimes it's the lot size. And it can also be, you know, there were also a lot of places that had sideline. Violations from the old days because, you know, they used to build stuff right on the edges of property. So if it's a 10 or 20 foot sideline, you'd have a shed or something right up against it. So there were just, I mean, historically, it's a lovely community, but the zoning sort of came in and out. So, I don't know how to do this. It would be very interesting to do what-if scenarios where, let's say, we'll just pick the purple part, the 60,000. The big ones. Yeah, the big ones with the 210 frontage. And if you could run what-if scenarios. Looking at where you bend those variables. Let's say one scenario would be to change the whole thing to R40. Just say, okay, we're going to change the whole thing. Everything's going to be that R40 is going to be our biggest. And make it conform to the lesser frontage as well as the lesser area.
What's the likely outcome to be in terms of the appearance of buildable lots? It would depend how many in that 60 square foot zone. How many of the lots are really just 60 square feet? Because if it's just 60 square feet, you can't divide it into two and make 240,000. So if in that purple zone, most of the lots are 80,000 and larger, then there's a chance you might actually be able to subdivide some of them. But if they really are mostly 60 foot lots with a couple of huge lots... It's not going to get you anything because you're not going to be able to subdivide those. You won't be able to make two. Well, you don't have to subdivide them. You could add dwelling units. Yeah, but you can do that now. You can add an ADU now. That doesn't change anything. You can still add an ADU. Well, maybe you could add more ADUs. So that's a problem because you end up... When we were drafting the ADU bylaws, one very tricky piece is that... If you add more than one ADU under certain circumstances, it becomes multifamily housing, and it's not zoned for multifamily housing. I understand, but that's the point. I think part of what Gina is looking at is looking beyond this and saying, what would the impact be? You're absolutely right. We are going to run up against some issues, whether it's multifamily or... Or a lot line size or something. You're talking about the context of an attached unit, for example. That's an ADU, but in the context of changing the minimum lot size, if you take 60 and say, well, now it could be 40, if you got the GIS maps and you discover that nearly all of the lots, let's say a huge majority of the lots in that purple zone, Or actually like 60, 62, then saying it could be 40 doesn't help you unless two neighbors get together and chop off a half each and give it to somebody else. But if you took 60 and said you could have a 30,000 square foot lot, and I'm not sure that would pass in town. But if it passed, then one family could chuck their lot in half and make two lots. But saying you can go from 60 to 40, if let's say 85% of the lots are only 60, 62, 64, it doesn't get you anywhere. But if you go from 60 to 30, then people can actually subdivide their lot and put in a second house, not an ADU, because they can do an ADU now. No, I understand. I'm really talking about mathematical modeling. Right. Where you set the constraints and you've described the situation in which a what-if scenario doesn't yield much outcome. Then you start looking for which what-if scenario does yield an outcome. I thought about this quite a bit. I find myself leaning very much toward trying to come up with some zones that are a new classification of cluster. And the hard thing here is we have so little big pieces of land to work with. We've got that one piece that, you know, it was the part of what town meeting about, where there's enough acreage that you could... potentially have little cottages on 5,000 square foot lots and create an eco-village with a big swath of land to put into conservation around it. Yeah, we do have things that allow for a conservation cluster already. Yeah, and I'm familiar with that. To think about something different is that that doesn't really, the increased density allowed is so small. And that when you need as many units as we probably need in small housing, then we need something different. Because you can't get builders to build these units unless they're as profitable as alternate activities. So you have to give them a density that they can do their spreadsheet and say, oh, well, this is as profitable as doing McMansions. So we can do an eco-cluster and make enough money to build the project. And it's not even so much a profitability issue, but it's a getting financing issue. They can't even get to profitability if they can't get financing. And I'm not sure that there's enough land in Wayland that's not wet to do anything like that. Unless you get people as a group, like a whole neighborhood's going to sell their house and their lots all together, a couple of lots together, because there's so little that's unbuilt already in Wayland that's buildable. Well, I'd like to spend more time talking about how could we take areas and make them multifamily, you know, present a multifamily option with an overlay. You know, it's tough because Acton is currently doing these eco-pillages happily because they have a big swath of land. I'm not sure taking 60,000 square foot lots and cutting them into 30,000 square foot lots would end up with anything other than just... Really covering land with lots of asphalt and concrete. And, you know, so it's like, how do we find something where we can increase the housing units densely so that we're leaving the green space, you know, viable habitat? Well, and that's hard, because anything that threatens that seriously is not going to get through town meeting. But... There are a lot of people who are looking for a way financially to stay in town. And becoming a landlord is not necessarily their cup of tea, but subdividing their lot and letting somebody build a lot, a house on the other side of their lot, that's more palatable to a lot of people who want to sort of age in place, who want to stay in town. And maybe they build a new house and move into it and sell the old house. But subdividing... Maybe more palatable to people who don't want to become landlords to an ADU. I live now in the condos next to traditions. 24 units. I was talking with somebody the other day who said that she moved here to live closer to her daughter. She really had a tough time trying to find a place to live. And we both agreed that we need more of that kind of structure. So that's maybe more doable. I mean, I live in the condos on launching. I'm a launching person. Same thing, it's condos because Some of the lots could have been made conforming, but some of the lots could not have. Some of the houses are on little teeny parcels and would never have been even close to conforming. This is not the military. Oh, it is? Okay. And that's 16 units or 12? 12 units. And even as the residents up there discussed decondoizing because it's silly that we're condos. We probably can't because at least two or three of the houses could never be made conforming. They're way undersized lots. Aren't they all undersized? The houses are, but the lots are not. So we have exclusive use areas for each of the houses. But particularly the houses that are on the corner of that little launcher way and Oxbow could never be made conforming and probably... Maybe two of the other units could never be linked in formal. But like my house, I have a huge section that goes way down into the woods behind my house. But some of them are very small. We couldn't gerrymander it into existence. But you know, it's not capitally affordable, but they were, by Wayland standards, affordable. And our units compared to the Mainstone units are substantially expensive. Will you keep these so we can get Rachel a copy? Okay. I'll put it on the next one. Okay. Why don't we get them back to you so you can take care of them all. We don't lose them in the next year. Yeah, sure. Are you giving them all that? If you want to. If you want to keep it, keep it. And if you want to give it back, give it back. Keep mine. Take a little bit. Okay. So it's okay if you keep them? Yes, absolutely. Do you want to keep yours? I'll try to leave it. I can't believe each of them, so I can put them in a minute. So the next thing is to reschedule our meetings. And Wednesday... If you're doing the Wednesdays, you have to avoid my planning for meetings. If you do it Tuesdays... We had all those dates. And you asked if we could do it on a different day. Yeah, if you do it Tuesdays, that would be great, but I'm happy to do them on Wednesdays, whatever you guys like. But we can at least talk about them. Sure. Okay, so let me see. I don't think I have anything regular on evenings. Actually, I have Thursday night theater. You have Thursday night what? Theater. Huntington Theater. So Tuesday and Wednesday, I think, are equal for me. And I'm easy. I have... Very bleak, scheduled other things, and I, you know, just ignore them. And Kathy, either is fine. You know, when you're scheduling with other people. If we move to Tuesday, before we were trying to fit in with the planning board, now we can just say the first Tuesday or the third Tuesday or whatever. Yep. So what are we now? Are we the second? We're on the second Wednesday. So if we move to Tuesday. Second Tuesday? The second Tuesday would be the 10th. In December it would be the 8th. So November 10th, December 8th. So we'll just say the second Tuesday of the month. Do we have them? I don't even know if we plan beyond that. I can take my calendars. Then it's January 12th, February 12th, February 9th, March 9th, April 13th, May 4th, I mean, May 11th, and 15th. Actually, June 8th is the second Tuesday. Thank you. Calendar items. At some point, the town's going to receive all those proposals for 212 Cachitua, and I imagine there'll be a disclosure meeting, like a presentation to the select board or something. We might want to have a scheduled meeting at that time so that we could all be present for the presentation. June 12 is what day? We don't know yet, but sometime after November 15th, they'll have them all, and then I have to believe there'll be a presentation to the select board, and it would just be nice if when that time comes we could announce. A meeting, a coincident meeting, so that we could all be present and say that. So we should schedule a meeting then? Well, I'm just saying, anticipating that we may need additional meetings if we want to be present at those because we're limited and how many of us could go unless we actually publicly declare to a meeting. We can say it'll be the second Tuesday of the month, but... Plus, there may be some additional ones that we declare in order to be able to see these presentations. So this will be where they come up with the final plan? Well, they have to pick, and I don't know what their process is going to be for hearing the... The presentations, whether they're just going to have the town planner show the documents that were submitted, or whether they're going to have the individual organizations come, whether they'll all come at one time, whether they'll come on different evenings, you know, just... I just wanted to suggest that we need to be aware. So these are just reviewing the submittals from the province. Okay. I'm sorry. I didn't quite know what it was. Oh, I'm sorry. This is the minute, so I have to understand more than I normally do. If I just nod and say I know what I'm doing, that may not be the case. Okay. Looks like we're all gearing up to leave. Is this, have we gotten through the agenda? The matter is not reasonable. Anything else? I suggest we adjourn. I move to adjourn. Second. Second. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.