OPINION: WHAT’S THE POINT OF A PLANNING BOARD?
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It’s a question that could be asked of any public board or committee in Amherst, and even of the Town Council. And it should be asked from time to time, shorn of any skepticism that popular usage has invested in “what’s the point,” because if it is asked straightforwardly it becomes surprisingly difficult to answer it straightforwardly.
I ask it of the Planning Board now because that body is smack in the middle of the most urgent questions our town is facing: the four major capital projects on the table (school, firehouse, public works depot, and expanded library), a reworking of the 2010 Master Plan, which makes vague but potentially significant suggestions for loosening the Zoning Bylaw by endorsing form-based zoning, and the vigorous plans that builders and developers have for turning Amherst Center (and most likely other village centers here) into “urban corridors” of greater density both of buildings and population.
I said that the Planning Board is “in the middle,” but that is not an apt metaphor for the recent past. Until last year, the Planning Board was appointed by the Town Manager, which made its “middleness” ambiguous at best. It was seen by the public as the “voice” of the Planning Department, and when it brought zoning changes to Town Meeting, it was most often speaking for the Town Planner. Moreover, there seemed to be implicit collusion between the Town and builders, developers, and major property owners. The ease with which the Planning Board allowed variances from the Zoning Bylaw and its disregard of the recommendations of the Design Review Board led many, including me, to harbor suspicions about the independence of the Planning Board. Recent construction projects downtown are evidence of the breakdown of the planning process.
Now the Planning Board is appointed by the Town Council, and from a structural viewpoint this seems like an improvement; it provides some separation of powers and, in this essential aspect of town life, some checks and balances. But it creates other issues. The Town Council, still working out its procedures and relationships, seems undecided on how much autonomy it wants the Planning Board to have. It is clear that the Council is the body with the final say on Planning Board proposals, but some councilors appear to want greater say in the formulating of those proposals.
I am not comfortable with the direction I see this going. The visible disagreement within the Town Council about an appointment to the Planning Board (and the subsequent reorganization of the appointment process) led some (again including me) to feel even more discomfort with the town planning process.
From its middling vantage-point the Planning Board must be Janus-faced. It looks one way and sees the professionals in Town Hall, whom it must both oversee and depend on. Looking the other way, it sees builders, developers, major property owners, and residents, whose interests may not coincide — and may, in fact, be in conflict. The middle is a complicated place to be.
Further complications ensue, as the Town Council considers the Zoning Bylaw and the 2010 Master Plan. The Town certainly appears to endorse the move towards greater density and infill in Amherst Center, but no one seems to be providing guidelines or oversight in determining how much density or how much infill. This is the role of an independent Planning Board, independent of both Town Council, which must approve its recommendations, and of Town Hall, which must implement them.
The future of Amherst’s appearance, finances, and success in attracting new businesses and new residents depends on having a Planning Board that is both independent of and supportive of the goals of the Town and of the Town Council. As uncomfortable as the middle may be when the stakes are as high as they are right now, that is where the Planning Board needs to be.
Michael Greenebaum was principal of Mark’s Meadow School from 1970-1991 and from 1974 taught Organization Studies in the Higher Education Center at the UMass School of Education. He served in Town Meeting from 1992, was on the first Charter Commission in 1993, and served on several town committees, including Town Commercial Relations Committee and the Long Range Planning Committee.
It’s hard to disagree with the idea that those who study the impacts and consequences of development; and how much projects are expected to comply with guidelines that protect deliberate goals, such as affordability, parking, and what we want our town to look and feel like. What is the disagreement? That a project can’t be profitable enough, if it needs to comply? That the highest and best use of a given plot is not the best investment? That our hybrid status as a town of families and a formidable college population creates an obstacle to win/wins? I’d love to see a summit of various interest groups, to come up with a practical philosophy of what is appropriate development, so proposals can be measured intelligently; and even create some examples of what we do want to attract to Amherst, ie: affordable downtown housing for young professionals and families; options for retirees, who want to live where the action is; a bulletproof standard, re parking, affordability, etc, that won’t keep getting waived, kicking the problem down the road.
I’m pretty sick of plans for apartments after apartments in Amherst. It used to be the norm for colleges to build dorms for students, allowing them to be on campus where the classes are within walking distance. Colleges want towns to provide apartments, and not have to be concerned with on campus living. Where’d that concept come from? The colleges have the room for building dorms, it must be then, business before education. Those plans for off campus apartments, with lack of parking, moves forward. And there are no plans afoot except to change the zoning to fit developers’ plans. Zoning is, was and has been there all along to protect homeowners and neighborhoods from desires to change the zoning to allow desired development. Seems like there’s always room for more apartments and no room for adequate parking. The concept of all students having cars and being able to live off campus used to be only for upperclassmen, and not any student. Conservative, vyes, but it makes sense when considering that Freshmen face making independent decisions, previously made by parental members, when two months previous they had been graduating from high school. And now there’s some thought to lower voting age! Please, where’s the reason for that?
The Charter could have provided for elected Planning and Zoning Boards. Would that have been a better choice? Do we want to discuss issue this again to think about amending the Charter?
Hilda, back in the day when Town Meeting provided genuine separation of powers I was lukewarm about an elected Planning Board and Zoning Board (especially since those boards provided effective checks and balances of each other. But now it is appropriate for the issue to be raised again. I worry that this would be too significant a change in the charter to fall under the local provisions for amending it and we would have to undergo electing a new Charter Commission again (and getting enough petition signatures to do so). I would much prefer evidence that both the Town Council and Town Hall acknowledge explicitly the importance of Planning Board independence from both.