Letter: Zoning Proposals in Williamstown 'Not Ready for Prim Time'

To the Editor:

A recent letter urged Williamstown residents to vote on all 10 proposed zoning articles – some with many subsections –at the Tuesday, June 14, town meeting at the high school gym.

Is debating such a long list of complicated, highly technical articles at a town meeting really the best way to do zoning?
Is debating these articles now, with a new, complicated, confusing set of voting rules and percentages advisable – especially when town counsel issued one set of answers on the number of votes required to pass the former Planning Board’s recommendations and then later had to issue a revised set?

Wow. I don't think so.

Has the board done anything over the last year, during COVID-19, to truly inform our residents about these articles? Did it conduct surveys or community engagement meetings? No.

Do our residents truly understand how one article inter-relates to another? No, because it has never been explained, and I sure cannot figure it out. How do the drastic reductions in lot size, lot frontage, and side-, front- and rear dimensional requirements affect houses to be built next to you or in your neighborhood?

Are residents aware that none of these changes were seriously studied or researched?

Are residents aware of any community having four family houses allowed as of right, without community hearings to give residents a voice? I surely do not.

Are residents aware that there is no provision to provide for affordability and therefore no additional diversity in these articles?

What harm is there to have one more year of review and community outreach so we are all so much better informed and the Planning Board has time to research each proposal and to see how other towns have fared with similar zoning changes?

To be frank, most of these articles are simply not ready for prime time.

Sherwood Guernsey
Williamstown, Mass.

Williamstown Fire Committee Talks Station Project Cuts, Truck Replacement

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:17AM / Friday, April 26, 2024

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Prudential Committee on Wednesday signed off on more than $1 million in cost cutting measures for the planned Main Street fire station.

 

Some of the "value engineering" changes are cosmetic, while at least one pushes off a planned expense into the future.

 

The committee, which oversees the Fire District, also made plans to hold meetings over the next two Wednesdays to finalize its fiscal year 2025 budget request and other warrant articles for the May 28 annual district meeting. One of those warrant articles could include a request for a new mini rescue truck.

 

The value engineering changes to the building project originated with the district's Building Committee, which asked the Prudential Committee to review and sign off.

 

In all, the cuts approved on Wednesday are estimated to trim $1.135 million off the project's price tag.

 

The biggest ticket items included $250,000 to simplify the exterior masonry, $200,000 to eliminate a side yard shed, $150,000 to switch from a metal roof to asphalt shingles and $75,000 to "white box" certain areas on the second floor of the planned building.

 

The white boxing means the interior spaces will be built but not finished. So instead of dividing a large space into six bunk rooms and installing two restrooms on the second floor, that space will be left empty and unframed for now.