Arlington Town Meeting: Zoning, Noise, And Parking Meter Money

ARLINGTON, MA — Arlington's Special Town Meeting opened Monday night with news that longtime Arlington resident and 91-year-old Town Meeting Member from Precinct 2 was stepping down. Elsie Fiore got a standing ovation as the moderator thanked her following her announcement.

And then the Special Town Meeting, when the 252 elected Town Meeting Members gather at Town Hall and work their way through questions for the legislative branch of Arlington, was underway. This special meeting had four issues on the docket. The major one, according to town officials, was the one that deals with zoning re codification.

Anyone is free to come watch, but only Town Meeting Members can vote.

Here are the basics:

Article 1- The talking part
This is mostly just time provided for the Town Meeting Members to hear from boards, committees, and commissions talk or give a report about anything that's on the Special Town Meeting's agenda.

Article 2 - Zoning
It's been a long time since the Zoning bylaw has been cleaned up. Over the years there have been bits added here and there. Since 1977 there have been 442 amendments. It's messy. It's been decades since someone went through and cleaned it up to make it clear.

It's outdated, difficult to navigate, look at or use, according to officials. It's out of sync with state law, according to officials. The massive cleanup began with an all boards meeting and in 2016 Town Meeting gave funds to start the process.

The Warrant Article asks Town Meeting members to vote on whether or not to approve the recent zoning recodification (aka clean up). Officials have been working to revise and clean up old zoning regulations to get rid of redundancies organize the bylaw make it easier to understand and shorten it without changing the actual meaning.

"Article 2 is very extensive and important as it is a complete recodification of our Zoning Bylaw and will impact our town for years to come. After many months of work and numerous public meetings, the ARB submitted the final draft of the Recodification of the Zoning Bylaw on January 22nd," reads a letter from Moderator John Leone.

Check out the latest draft of the bylaw on the town’s website.

There were multiple amendments (some nine from citizens groups) to the zoning bylaw passed after about an hour of discussion most were approved.

Result of the vote: The final vote passed 148-35.

Article 3 - Noise bylaw
Asks Town Meeting members to vote to amend a noise bylaw . This amendment would exempt Department of Public Works and public utilities work and activity done on public and private ways during the prohibited times of operation.

If passed, DPW could work before 8 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday, before 7 a.m. on weekdays and after 8 p.m. on any day.

Article 4 and Article 5 - Parking Benefits District
Both cover an initiative that would take revenue from the parking meters in Arlington Center (after credit card processing fees and coin collection) and use a portion of the projected $264,848 to improve the Center, and how to do that.

Article 4 would create a process by which the Parking Implementation and Governance Committee would create and review a list of expenditures for the funds. The committee would then bring these recommendations to the Finance Committee, Capitol Planning Committee and Town Meeting.
Article 5 asks the town to endorse proposed expenditures for the parking benefits district.

Article 6 - Hardy School Expansion
Vote to appropriate approximately $1.2 million for for the expansion at the Hardy School in East Arlington. Town Meeting members will also figure out how to raise and use the money.

Other useful links:

Reports to Special Town Meeting

• Board of Selectmen
  
• Finance Committee
  
• Arlington Redevelopment Board
  
• Capital Planning Committee
  

And a sweet addition? Girl Scouts will be selling cookies in the front lobby of Town Hall and Minuteman High School students will be selling refreshments, according to Moderator John Leone.

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Photo by Jenna Fisher/Patch