EXPLANATIONS
FOR  SPECIAL TOWN MEETING
WARRANT ARTICLES
NOVEMBER 13TH, 2007

Combined Reports of Selectmen and Advisory Committee
 

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ARTICLE 2
This article is inserted in the Warrant for any Town Meeting when there are unsettled labor contracts. Town Meeting must approve the funding for any collective bargaining agreements.

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ARTICLE 3
This article is inserted in the Warrant for any Town Meeting when budget amendments for the current fiscal year are required. For FY2008, the warrant article is necessary to appropriate additional revenue, re-allocate savings in the Group Health Insurance line-item that were generated by plan design changes agreed to by the Town and the unions, and amend the Water and Sewer Enterprise Fund.

 

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ARTICLE 4
In 1988 Town Meeting confronted a state economy with considerable inflation and the Town had only $8,000,000 at the end of the Fiscal Year. This year the Town had

$85,000,000 at the end of the 2006 Fiscal Year according to the Town Treasurer. Does Town Meeting wish to continue the Trash Fee or Refuse Fee regardless of the change in economic circumstances?

 

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ARTICLE 5
The Public Records Law requires public disclosure of all Town records on request by a citizen. This By-Law gives Town Meeting Members the information it needs from the Audit Committee but the By-Law saves each Town Meeting Member the individual need to request the essential cash information that the Audit Committee must communicate to the Board of Selectmen and Town Meeting each year. The Board of Selectmen and 240 Town Meeting Members would get the annual “Cash and Short Term Investments” report without the necessity of sending individual requests to the Audit Committee for this essential information.

The Board of Selectmen and 240 Town Meeting Members have a fiduciary responsibility for the Towns’ Cash. They need to be efficiently advised about the money for which they are responsible.
 

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ARTICLE 6
Our Information Technology Department now has a wonderful, user-friendly, action-packed website (www.town.brookline.ma.us/) and listserv (www.townofbrooklinemass.com/Listservr/whatsnew.asp, now 2194 subscribers), and – for ad hoc committees – is now doing much of this article’s mandates. This proposal is largely self-explanatory and will, as usual, be subject to welcome amendments of some details and specific language in the next three months; but hopefully preserving its overall goal to bring Brookline’s use of the Open Meeting Law into the 21st century internet age. Some petitioners have tried to get the thrust of this article accomplished for over a year; and the selectmen have commendably led by example, complying with virtually all of its provisions. Now all Town committees should do so – at minimal (if any) additional work. Cf., the lesser requirements of the Open Meeting Laws, currently Mass. G.L. c. 39, §§23A et seq.:

“Except in an emergency, a notice of every meeting of any governmental body shall be filed with the clerk ... and the notice ... shall, at least forty-eight hours, including Saturdays but not Sundays and le-gal holidays, prior to such meeting, be publicly posted in the office of such clerk or on the principal official bulletin board ...” and ...

“A governmental body shall maintain accurate records of its meetings, setting forth the date, time, place, members present or absent and action taken at each meeting ... . The records of each meeting shall become a public record and be available to the public; ... ”

 

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ARTICLE 7
This proposed by-law amendment is intended to provide a more comprehensive and contemporary approach to addressing the proliferation of graffiti on private and public property in the Town.

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ARTICLE 8
What has prompted the reinstatement of bicycle registration is that bicycles traveling on the streets of Brookline are on the increase. Now is the time to have mandatory registration of bicycles. This would be for the protection of bicycle owners, as a result of theft or any other occurrence that may take place.

 

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ARTICLE 9
A foundation permit protects a contractor from inadvertently constructing a foundation in the wrong location or which is not the correct size. It also serves to protect the Town from a developer over building or building on a location that was not approved by the Town.

These objectives can be achieved through the foundation permitting process, which will insure that the foundation for a proposed project is in conformity with the Town’s zoning bylaws, special permit, and any variance granted by the Zoning Board of Appeals, and by having an independent entity, a Registered Land Surveyor, verify that the location and size of the foundation as constructed conforms with the original approved plans.

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ARTICLE 10
In the fall of 2005, Town Meeting established the Coolidge Corner "Interim Planning Overlay District" (IPOD) in which most development was suspended pending study leading to the creation of a Coolidge Corner District Plan. Town Meeting also created the Coolidge Comer District Planning Council to (in the words of that Warrant Article) "guide" the study. The Coolidge Corner District Plan itself was to be "a one year planning process." Town Meeting set a sunset date for the IPOD, but not for the Council. In the fall of 2006, Town Meeting extended the life of the IPOD until April 30, 2007 and required the Council to hold a public hearing prior to the completion of its work but imposed no termination date for the Council.

The Comprehensive Plan provides that, "District Plan(s) . . . each be developed by a District Planning Council of neighborhood representatives, Town Meeting members, small business owners, property owners and Town officials" (page 3 1) and "adopted by the Planning Board as an integral part of the Comprehensive Plan. . . . " (page 32) It specifies no termination date for District Planning Councils.

According to the Comprehensive Plan, however, circumstances may require the District Plan as submitted to the Planning Board to be amended. (page 34) As the Planning Board is not charged with creating the District Plan, the implication is that the Coolidge Corner District Planning Council, which is charged with "guiding" the District Plan, should also guide any "agreed amendment[s]" to the District Plan. (page 34)

Additionally, the Comprehensive Plan maintains that "from time to time" it itself "will need updating" and "public review…” (page 9) Given that the Comprehensive Plan envisions the District Plan to be an "integral part" of the Comprehensive Plan, the implication is that the Coolidge Corner District Planning Council should continue as long as the Comprehensive Plan is subject to update and review.

The Coolidge Corner District Planning Council was the first of the District Planning Councils called for by the Comprehensive Plan. It was able to guide a community study and, with the invaluable and dedicated work of the Dept. of Planning and Community Development, produce a District Plan for Coolidge Comer. This planning process encouraged the major interest groups of Coolidge Corner - notably the commercial community and the residents - to understand each other's often conflicting needs and goals and reach consensus on a variety of key issues with respect to the future of the Coolidge Corner area. Of note, the Coolidge Comer District Plan itself recommends that the Coolidge Corner Council continue as a mechanism for residents and merchants to work together (as they rightly should given that Coolidge Corner is where they live and make their living) to address Coolidge Corner issues as they arise.

The most intensively developed part of CityplaceBrookline, Coolidge Comer is also the leading target in the Town for further development. Sponsors of this Warrant Article believe that during the coming years of anticipated unprecedented development pressures, it is particularly important for the District Council to continue its work as the only forum for creating community agreement among residents and business owners in Coolidge Corner relative to matters such as parking, traffic and the need for open space, to be a voice to enforce the hard-won consensus already embodied in the District Plan and to "guide" subsequent amendments and revisions to the District Plan as needed.

The sponsors also believe that because neither the Comprehensive Plan nor the enabling legislation for the Coolidge Corner District Planning Council specifies any termination date for the Council, and that, if anything, both the Comprehensive Plan and this legislation imply a continuance of the Council, that Town Meeting should take this opportunity to formalize the composition and responsibilities of the Coolidge Corner Council. To leave the matter murky and in limbo would not only miss an opportunity but, also, would pave the way for future misunderstandings and unnecessary future complications.

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ARTICLE 11
This zoning amendment is being submitted by the Planning and Community Development Department with the support of the Zoning Bylaw Committee. At last spring’s Town Meeting, a new zoning district was created for about 90 parcels near Coolidge Corner that limited development to three dwelling units per lot. This new F-1.0 zone was designed to serve as a middle ground between two-family (T) zones and multi-family (M) zones, and followed from the recommendations of the Coolidge Corner planning process. At the time only a limited list of properties were included in the new zone. This article adds new properties to the F zones that have predominately three-family uses and which have a massing and density consistent with the goals of the F-1.0 zone. Not all properties considered for the F-1.0 zone are included in this article. After discussion and analysis, the Zoning Bylaw Committee decided to exclude some properties that were in smaller groups of buildings rather than those that representative of a larger streetscape.
 

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ARTICLE 12
This zoning amendment is being submitted by the Planning and Community Development Department, following a vote of approval from the Zoning Bylaw Committee, in response to concerns about applications to demolish existing buildings in the Coolidge Corner area. The planning process recently completed for the Coolidge Corner area specified that the existing streetscapes in the district should be preserved. This proposed amendment to the Zoning Bylaw would create a new overlay district roughly matching the study area for the planning process. This overlay would retain all of the existing zoning requirements in place for this area, but would also add a requirement that any demolition of a building undergo design review. This requirement builds on an amendment to the design review section approved last year that required design review for certain exterior demolitions.

This article would also make a few other changes to the design review section of the bylaw. It would reduce the threshold for design review of multifamily dwelling units from ten units to four. It would also add a design criterion that explicitly requires reviewing a proposed development for consistency with the existing streetscape. This criterion is based on the discussion of Form Based Zoning that followed the Coolidge Corner planning process. It would incorporate some elements of Form Based Zoning into the existing design review process, rather than creating an entirely new process for looking at the relationship of a proposed development to the surrounding urban form.

 

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ARTICLE 13
This zoning amendment is being submitted by the Planning and Community Development Department, with the support of the Zoning Bylaw Committee. Currently, T zones permit two dwelling units on a parcel, with an exception that permits up to six attached townhouses by Special Permit. This amendment would reduce the number of permitted attached townhouses from six to two, making it consistent with the number of units otherwise permitted on a lot in a T zone. In order to create a level playing field among all forms of two-family dwellings, this article would permit those two attached units by right rather than by Special Permit.

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ARTICLE 14
This zoning amendment is being submitted by the Planning and Community Development Department after close work with the Zoning Bylaw Committee. The purpose of the proposed change is to make Paragraph 1, which lists public benefit categories, consistent with Table 5.02, which lists how much bonus floor area for each category may be allowed by the Board of Appeals. Additionally, an introductory paragraph has been added, which states that the Board of Appeals must find that the public benefits offered are commensurate with the requested FAR bonus. Please note that FAR bonuses may not exceed the maximum FARs listed in Table 5.01 – Table of Dimensional Requirements. Furthermore, the only projects that can take advantage of this section are those developments on properties that are 20,000 sq. ft. or greater as well as in a zoning district with an allowed FAR of 1.5 or greater.
 

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ARTICLE 15
In 1905 the Town acquired through a "taking" approximately 502 s.f. of land at the northern end of the private way known as Kerrigan Place situated off of Boylston Street near the Boylston Street Playground. The taking was done in connection with the abolition of the railroad grade crossing which extended Kerrigan Place across the tracks of the Boston & Albany Railroad, now the MBTA Green Line. The Railroad Commissioners at the time directed that, in connection with the abandonment of the grade crossing, Kerrigan Place be "widened," presumably to permit room for carriages to turn around at the end of Kerrigan Place. Kerrigan Place is approximately 12 feet wide for its entire length. The 502 s.f. parcel is being used by the occupants of the only remaining house on Kerrigan Place, a 3 story building, to park a motor vehicle and to keep trash cans and outdoor storage of children's play equipment. The land on which the building is located is under agreement to be sold and the building demolished in connection with the proposed redevelopment of 111 Boylston Street, the former Red Cab property. The remaining houses that were located on Kerrigan Place have long since been demolished. The 502 s.f. parcel is of no particular use to the Town, particularly since Kerrigan Place as a private way will be abolished. The developer of 111 Boylston Street has offered to convey to the Town an equivalent parcel along Davis path, a 30' wide public walkway adjacent to the Boylston Street Playground. The parcel to be conveyed to the Town would become part of the Boylston Street Playground and Davis Path and be subject to Article XCVII of the Massachusetts Constitution requiring a 2/3 vote of the General Court to allow it to be used for any purpose other than open space. The developers have indicated to the Board of Selectmen that they would enter into a Memorandum of Understanding with the Town once the development approvals for 111 Boylston Street have been obtained to maintain the landscaping along Davis Path. An aerial photograph of the affected land is attached as Exhibit "B".


EXHIBIT B

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ARTICLE 16
Existing statutes prohibit the leasing of Town-owned property for more than five years. This article is seeking legislation which would permit the Town to give the Brookline Arts Center (BAC) long-term occupancy of its current building, which will allow the BAC to offer art education classes and continue to maintain its building.

The Brookline Arts Center has occupied the old Monmouth Street Fire Station at 86 Monmouth Street since 1968: under short leases for the first twelve years, and for twenty-seven years of its current thirty-year lease. During this time, the Arts Center has offered art classes and other educational programs in the visual arts for all ages. Many of its programs are free to the public, and BAC offers many scholarship programs for low-income residents that allow them to take art classes at reduced rates.

During this time, the BAC has repaired and maintained the historic building, including extensive renovations of the interior space, a new roof, new heating system, new stairs, new second means of egress, the addition of a ceramics studio, addition of a jewelry studio and a new art gallery. The BAC has always been a good neighbor and asset to the community. The Town has not provided any funds for renovations or maintenance of the building.

In order to raise outside grants to support the continued maintenance and long-term improvement of its building, the BAC needs a longer term lease than 5 years, in order to convince the various sources of funds of the continued occupancy of the building. They are not contemplating any immediate expansion of the building. As in the past, all renovations in the building would be subject to the review of the Building Department.

The BAC started in 1964 with 15 students. In recent years, 1900 students attend 325 classes annually; 7000 people attend other free cultural and educational programs at the Arts Center and its gallery; senior citizens have attended discounted art classes; $10,000 to $12,000 in scholarships have been given to low-income students, faculty and volunteers; and an estimated15,000 have seen “Artist Spotlight” programs produced with the BAC on Brookline Public Access TV.

The Arts Center organizes free gallery receptions and artist talks regularly, offering approximately 35 such programs annually. In addition, the BAC has offered ArtReach (free art classes for low-income children and seniors) at Brookline Housing Authority buildings since 1971. For the past 33 years, BAC has organized Crafts Showcase, a free exhibition and sale of fine crafts in December, featuring more than 100 artists from around the nation. In combination, these programs introduce a broad audience to the experience of art and encourage easy public interaction with working artists.

This article is not seeking any funds from the Town.
 

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ARTICLE 17
In almost every week’s Brookline TAB we hear of widespread dissatisfaction with Brookline’s zoning enforcement. Town Meeting Members were told that the new position of Zoning Administrator was created to address that dissatisfaction. But since the new position has no enforcement powers, it’s not at all clear what the Zoning Administrator does.

This Article is meant to finish the job we thought we were doing back in 2006, by creating a Zoning Enforcement Officer who will have the power and duty to enforce the Town’s zoning bylaw. To do that takes home rule legislation. This proposed Home Rule Petition is based on legislation which has been in effect in Watertown since 1987.

This is not intended to create a new position, but to enhance the present position of Zoning Administrator, converting it into a true Zoning Enforcement Officer, with power to enforce our zoning bylaw.
 

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ARTICLE 18
This article seeks to clarify and fully establish the authority of the Transportation Board to regulate and license valet parking services in the Town that utilize public ways, public off-street parking areas or other public property under the control of the Town. Under Chapter 317 of the Acts of 1974, it appears that the Transportation Board already has the statutory authority to regulate valet parking under its power to adopt regulations "relative to...the movement, stopping, standing, or parking of vehicles...on, and their exclusion from, all or any streets, ways,...and public off-street parking areas under the control of the town,,,," However, the Transportation Board's authority to regulate valet parking services under this provision has been challenged on the ground that such regulation unlawfully conflicts with provisions of the General Laws. This proposed amendment to Chapter 317 of the Acts of 1974 is intended to eliminate any potential conflict with other provisions of law and should eliminate any uncertainty as to whether or not the Transportation Board has the legal authority to regulate valet parking services that utilize public ways, public off-street parking areas or other public property under the control of the Town.
 

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ARTICLE 19
After 35 years of professional public service (and a lifetime commitment) to the Town of Brookline, Robert T. Lynch, Director of Park and Recreation will retire December 31, 2007. Robert T. Lynch has been a mentor, a coach, a friend and a leader to many. His civic pride and commitment to the community are exemplary. He dedicated his personal life and his professional life to Brookline, to Recreation and to the citizens of Brookline. He graduated from the Heath School and Brookline High School. He coached Brookline Pop Warner and Brookline High School Football for over twelve years. He was a Town Meeting member from 1975-1981. This proposal will acknowledge Bob Lynch’s life-long service and commitment to the Town of Brookline’s recreation programs. The Town’s Naming Committee, in accordance with the by-law, has evaluated the proposal to change the name of the municipal golf course by applying its established guidelines and criteria and supports the proposed name change. In addition, the Park and Recreation Commission also unanimously support this proposal.
 

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ARTICLE 20
At the Annual Town Meeting in May 2007, the Moderator’s committee on Voting Technology for Town Meeting presented its final report. The committee was concerned with “forms of voting that record and/or display the votes of each Town Meeting member on matters at Town Meeting, without the necessity of a so-called “roll call” vote. Electronic voting is one of three methods analyzed by the committee. The other options considered were a card system and the current roll call vote system. The committee found electronic voting to be the fastest of the methods. The report included a relatively detailed description of the anticipating working of an electronic voting system. The committee judged that electronic voting promised moderately high security. Electronic voting was estimated to have an acquisition cost of $20,000, a modest annual maintenance cost, and some ongoing costs for administration.

The committee did not make a recommendation. Instead, the committee invited each Town Meeting member to weigh the underlying issues.

This warrant article asks Town Meeting explicitly to consider electronic voting. The petitioner is attracted to electronic voting not only because it would quickly provide an electronic record of the vote of each Town Meeting member, but that the electronic record could also be easily posted on the Town web site to make the information readily available to the public. If electronic voting can be done quickly, the petitioner believes that Town Meeting will record the votes of members on many more votes than is the case currently with the roll-call voting system that is now in place.

The warrant article also identifies a need for improved projection equipment for the high school auditorium. Administration of an electronic voting system will be much more efficient if the projection system is improved. The cost of an improved projection system is estimated to be $8,000.

The warrant article is a resolution asking only that a budget item for an electronic voting system to be used at Town Meeting be included in the fiscal year 2009 budget that is presented at the 2008 annual Town Meeting. The resolution will be helpful to the Board of Selectmen and the Advisory Committee in preparing the FY 2009 budget.

The resolution leaves open questions about the manner in which an electronic voting system would be used. The petitioner’s premise is that a sensible pattern of use of electronic voting will be developed by Town Meeting as it gains experience in using the method.

 

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ARTICLE 21
The Hoar Sanctuary, named after the family which donated this large undeveloped wooded and wetlands area for the purpose of preserving this priceless natural resource and open, undeveloped space, is perhaps the last such wildlife refuge in the Town of Brookline. The Sanctuary is home to innumerable species of wildlife. It is home to a vast array of birds and the last known refuge for certain species of amphibians which depend upon the Sanctuary’s wetlands. Importantly, the Sanctuary has become home to animals such as foxes, wild turkeys and the like which have been displaced by the ever increasing development of every square inch of developable space in Brookline. The Sanctuary is also an educational treasure utilized by students in our community. Natural resources and open space such as this, once lost, can never be regained. Even if land can be reacquired, once developed, it is never the same. Wetlands cannot be simply restored. The development proposed for the buffer zone to the Sanctuary by a Princeton Road resident, will result in the cutting down of majestic trees which took hundreds of years to grow, the blasting of ledge which exists throughout this area and the paving of ground, all resulting in a harmful and irremediable change in the environment of the Sanctuary. The term “buffer zone” is actually a misnomer under our town’s Wetlands By-Law. It is simply a zone in which development cannot take place absent review by the Conservation Commission. It is not, as the term implies, a zone in which development is prohibited. Thus, the protections afforded by such zones can be eroded by development such as that proposed on the border of the Hoar Sanctuary. To create a true Buffer Zone for the Hoar Sanctuary, the town must acquire this land to insure that it can never be developed and threaten the Sanctuary and its wildlife inhabitants. Of course, the Town must compensate the owners of these properties for this “taking.” However, this is a small price to pay for protecting the treasure which is the Sanctuary for all Brookline residents for all time.

The purpose of this article is to explore the options for preserving this natural resource though the process of eminent domain including a determination of the cost of such an undertaking and how best to effectuate it. Since budget items are scheduled for the regular town meeting in the spring, this article is in the form of a resolution to have a committee formed to determine the necessary facts and process and report back in time for an appropriate appropriations warrant article in the spring.
 

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ARTICLE 22
Existing federal and state tax credits are available under current tax laws for purchase and installation of alternative energy equipment. However, there is no option at the local level to allow municipalities to encourage development of alternative energy sources.

Massachusetts General Laws authorize municipalities, by a vote of the city council or town meeting, to adopt annually real estate tax exemptions. Brookline town meeting annually votes for real estate tax exemptions for real estate owned by the elderly, a surviving spouse with a child, the blind, or veterans.

This article requests the Board of Selectmen to ask Brookline’s State Representatives to submit legislation that would allow the Town and other municipalities to adopt tax exemptions or credits for the purchase cost of any new solar or wind-powered device. (The increased value of a home for solar and wind-powered devices is already exempt from increased valuation.)

Just as a goal of the Patrick administration is to develop Massachusetts as a leader in alternative energy by promoting the use of clean and renewable energy, this resolution will encourage support for a local option that would allow municipalities to complement these state sustainability goals at the local level by providing real estate tax exemptions or credits to owners utilizing such energy sources. Ideally, this local tax exemption would be adjusted annually for inflation.

For example, if a homeowner spent $20,000 on a new photovoltaic or solar hot water system, the net cost after tax credits would be calculated as follows:

* a level of $2,000 is used in this example because this would likely be a reduction of an itemized deduction (as opposed to a tax credit) for federal individual income taxes, and therefore the financial advantage would be reduced by the taxpayer’s tax bracket.

The homeowner would have to apply to the assessor for this abatement. This option would be available annually, if authorized by a vote of Town Meeting.
 

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ARTICLE 23
In May 2007, Town Meeting passed a Resolution calling for the creation of a Selectmen's Committee, tasked with creating state legislation as described above, to be submitted within 90 days. The Committee is off to a good start, but due to the difficulty of meeting during the summer months, it will require some additional time to formulate specific legislation. This Resolution is meant to be a place holder, which will allow a more specific motion to be presented to the 2007 Fall Special Town Meeting.
 

ARTICLE 24
Any reports from Town Officers and Committees are included under this article in the Combined Reports. Town Meeting action is not required on any of the reports.