North Adams Council Gives Initial OK to Zoning Change
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The City Council wrapped up business in about 30 minutes on Tuesday, moving several ordinance changes forward.
A zoning change that would add a residential property to the commercial zone on State Road was adopted to a second reading but met with some pushback. The Planning Board recommended the change.
The vote was 5-2, with two other councilors abstaining, indicating there may be difficulty reaching a supermajority vote of six for final passage.
Centerville Sticks LLC (Tourists resort) had requested the extension of the Business 2 zone to cover 935 State Road. Centerville had purchased the large single-family home adjacent the resort in 2022.
Ben Svenson, principal of Centerville, had told a joint meeting of the Planning Board and City Council earlier this month that it was a matter of space and safety.
The resort had been growing and an office building across Route 2 was filled up.
"We've had this wonderful opportunity to grow our development company. That's meant we have more office jobs and we filled that building up," he said. "This is really about safety. Getting people across Route 2 is somewhat perilous."
Neighbors on Rickards Street whose homes are to the rear of 935 State Road expressed their opposition to the plans, fearing it would create a "domino effect" of further development.
"We purchased our home on Rickards Street 22 years ago and part of what drew us to this location was the quiet and welcoming neighborhood that we thoroughly enjoy," said Paula Malloy on Tuesday. "In addition, we have made significant investment in our home to create a space that we enjoy coming home to and certainly did not anticipate that in our future we could potentially be surrounded by additional commercial property."
Edward Briggs wondered what could be built on the land should the house be razed in the future.
Eric Kerns, a partner in the resort, noted that Tourists had listened to the neighborhood and scaled back plans to build a laundry at the site to service the hotel. They were also willing to submit to further regulations to limit use to offices to allay future fears.
"This option is the only option available to us to do anything with that parcel," he said. "If there is a more restrictive mechanism that would only allow us to do those offices in that building, we'd love to know what that mechanism is the zoning board is not able to grant us variances. And so based on our understanding of how the city ordinance was written, this is like our only option is to get rezoned."
Councilor Ashley Shade said she had serious reservations about the zoning change and thought the council should get the solicitor's opinion first.
"I still see that as spot zoning and I don't feel comfortable voting on this until we have a solicitor telling us otherwise," she said.
Her colleagues agreed and voted to amend the order to include pending the solicitor's opinion. It was also requested the solicitor consider how the use of the property might be limited.
Councilors Peter Breen and Wayne Wilkinson abstained from debate and vote on the ordinance.
Wilkinson wasn't sure if he had a conflict, saying, "I've always known in the past if you think there may be a chance for conflict that you should abstain."
He said he would seek a ruling on the conflict and, if there was none, if he could vote on final adoption. This came after Councilor Keith Bona noted "If they're abstaining now they will have to abstain later."
Councilor Lisa Blackmer motioned it not be brought back until May 28 because there will be an absences at the next meeting.
"I'm just hoping that at least if we start with nine on the 28th, we have to take two out, but that still gives us seven councilors to have a discussion and vote," she said.
The zoning ordinance was passed to a second reading and published with Shade and Council President Bryan Sapienza voting against.
In other business:
• The council continued to the next meeting revising the ordinances to remove fees and an amended order to adopt an update to a state law regarding parking fines. Bona said the Finance Committee wanted to confer with General Code, the company that maintains the city's online ordinances, on how changes should be arranged.
• The council passed to a second reading and publication a repeal of a zoning noise ordinance on recommendation of the Planning Board. It had voted to repeal two other ordinances with conflicting decibel levels in February.
Tags: commercial zoning,
