The Waban and Newtonville Area Councils voted and submitted this letter to the Chair of the Zoning and Planning Committee, Deb Crossley, and the Zoning and Planning Committee regarding their concerns about the community engagement process for the proposed village center zoning framework.
They emphasized their role in local governance, their concern that the engagement process “does not provide residents with the requisite information needed to reach informed opinions on the proposed zoning changes,” and insufficient time within the six-weeks allocated to “digest and disseminate” the information to the community to conduct meaningful outreach. Although several members of the respective Area Councils are also participating in the Community Network Engagement, they emphasized that their participation was not to bypass full participation of the Area Councils.
The Newton Highlands Area Council did not vote in favor of joining this letter (the vote was 4-4) but voted in a special meeting held on September 10 to send a separate letter focused on the timeframe and requesting until the end of the year to complete the engagement process and provide feedback. The Upper Falls Area Council also did not join this letter.
