The Planning Board has announced a multiphase drafting and outreach plan to prepare a new senior housing bylaw before the Spring 2021 Town Meeting. The board workshopped the plan at its Nov. 2 meeting, and Director of Community and Economic Development Chris Ryan and Planning Board Chair Justin Brown presented it to the Select Board at that board’s Nov. 3 meeting.
Over the summer, the Planning Board wrote a new bylaw that would have allowed the construction of senior housing including housing types not normally allowed in Harvard, such as dense housing clusters, townhouses, or apartments. The board had originally planned to present it for a vote at the Fall 2020 Town Meeting, but tabled it instead.
Board members cited different reasons for the decision, ranging from a belief that the bylaw would not pass to a belief that the bylaw would harm Harvard’s rural character. All agreed that the bylaw’s development and the public outreach process was rushed, as COVID-19 disrupted the board’s efforts over the summer.
The new plan calls for several phases of preparation between now and the next town meeting. Starting immediately, Planning Board members will write up their opinions on how the tabled bylaw should be changed. The board will synthesize these opinions into a new draft bylaw at its Nov. 16 meeting.
The board will then conduct surveys and meet with focus groups, aiming to complete this process by early February. These outreach efforts will attempt to identify the opinions of both Harvard’s older citizens and the general population about what they want from the senior housing bylaw and what housing types they would find acceptable. This phase will include meetings with knowledgeable people, such as housing developers and former Planning Board members. By the end of February, the board will alter the bylaw to incorporate the public feedback.
Planning Board member Gwen Leonard described the focus group members as a “sounding board,” and Ryan said, “It is helpful to know who the community’s influencers are.” Brown cautioned that the Planning Board should be careful to remain at the helm of the bylaw drafting process, consulting focus group members for advice but not allowing them to take over the direction of the project.
From the start of March up to the Spring 2021 Town Meeting in May, the board will conduct public hearings and outreach meetings. While the goal is to have a final draft prepared by March, the board will remain open to changes based on new feedback.
At the Select Board meeting, Select Board chair Alice von Loesecke requested that the Planning Board keep an up-to-date version of the bylaw available on its website so that members of the public could follow the development process. Ryan said that keeping the draft completely updated will not be possible, because it will be edited continually, but that he will post a new version whenever the board makes substantive changes.
Select Board member Kara Minar suggested that the Planning Board consider breaking its senior housing goals into several smaller bylaws to be proposed over multiple town meetings in the coming years, saying voters will be unlikely to support a single bylaw that makes too many changes at the same time. Brown responded that the Planning Board aims to use its survey process to figure out how much change voters are comfortable with and propose a bylaw that reflects that.
