Beverly Debate Balances Downtown Character, Affordable Housing

BEVERLY, MA — The latest attempt to reel in the overdevelopment of downtown Beverly at the same time as preserving, and even increasing, affordable housing opportunities in the city brought two hours of discussion during a joint public hearing of the City Council and Planning Board Monday night.

In contrast to a uniform three-story height restriction for new building projects across the city that Ward 6 City Councilor Matthew St. Hilaire brought forth for an extensive public hearing in October — which was again continued as unfinished business on Monday — the ordinance change addressed on Monday would eliminate the "tall building overlay" district downtown entirely, reduce height limits in two downtown districts encompassing Cabot and Rantoul streets and increase the percentage of the level of affordable housing required in new construction.

"What we heard was that we have to do something quickly," Beverly Director of Planning and Development Darlene Wynne said. "We want to see progress. So this is the quick fix that we could put into place to mitigate what we heard people say in that we don't want to see the same heights on Cabot that we are seeing on Rantoul."

The meeting consisted of two hours of comment from City Councilors, Planning Board members and the public. As was the case when St. Hilaire's proposal was discussed, the comments were split between those fearing the neighborhood character and congestion changes that come with overdevelopment with those who view restrictions on building heights and densities as an impediment to the need for more housing.

While this ordinance would limit the size of some new buildings, the amended inclusionary housing ordinance would also require 12 percent of new housing to be offered at 60 percent of market value and would decrease the threshold for an exemption to that from a six-unit to a four-unit development.

Wynne said this change was meant to increase the number of most affordable units in the city. At 60 percent of market value, a one-bedroom unit in the city would be between $1,473 and $1,683 and a two-bedroom unit between $1,683 and $2,103.

"I support these changes and appreciate the effort to sort of refine the zoning — especially within Wards 2 and 3," Ward 2 City Councilor Estelle Rand said. "Even though I believe these are appropriate changes to address the fatigue in height and development that especially Ward 2 has experienced within the last decade I think we still need to look at adding housing in other wards."

St. Hilaire said he still prefers the blanket new building height restriction proposed in his ordinance.

"Why is this better than three stories across the board?" he said. "For me, I would prefer that we limit as much as we can until we get some answers from the state (on the MBTA overlay district requirements). But this is better than what we have today."

Ward 5 Councilor Kathleen Feldman said that she agrees with Rand that more affordable housing solutions must be examined outside of the downtown — such as accessory dwelling units or so-called "in-law apartments" — and noted that what might be best for downtown height restrictions might not work as well for her Ward, which includes the industrial park.

Wynne said this particular ordinance focused primarily on the downtown height restrictions.

"Not just because it's transit-adjacent but also because it shares in the priority of developing and creating new opportunities in the city for both commercial and residential development where infrastructure already exists," she said, "and where an incremental change in infrastructure demand is both less expensive and where it is more able to accommodate new growth."

Wynne noted that the ordinance discussed on Monday is a "piece of the package" of zoning in the city and that the details if adopted, could be tweaked or altered as they are further examined down the road, or as the state rules regarding the MBTA overlay district ultimately necessitate.

While the City Council closed the public hearing on Monday, the Planning Board left its part of it open to allow for more public comment at its Dec. 13 meeting. The Planning Board is required to make a recommendation to the City Council on whether to adopt the changes within 21 days and the City Council will then take the recommendation up for a discussion — which at that point will not include public comment — and vote on the proposed ordinance.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)