Framingham Zoning Board of Appeals Denies Dover Amendment Protection for Salem End Rd Development

In the final showdown at the March 11, 2026, meeting of the Framingham Zoning Board of Appeals, the board voted 3-0 to deny the developer Dover Amendment protection for the property at 356 & 368 Salem End Rd. This ended the developer’s attempt to turn a 4 acre pristine waterfront property, zoned for single family residential development, into the equivalent of a 50 unit motel.

The developer’s partner in this unfortunate affair, New England Center for Children (NECC), came out of the proceedings with its reputation significantly tarnished, and one hopes that this non-profit organization can get back to its core mission of helping significantly disabled children along the path to a productive life, rather than engaging in financial side ventures such as this, which showed a complete lack of empathy for the residents in a quiet, wooded neighborhood of Framingham.

This whole unfortunate affair has been covered in a series of prior articles:

Salem End Rd Waterfront Property Developer Hides 80% of Lease Critical to Dover Amendment Approval (March 10, 2026)

Framingham Zoning Board of Appeals Heads for a Showdown on Salem End Rd Waterfront Property (March 9, 2026)

Nanette Magnani Makes the Case to Protect Waterfront Land on Salem End Rd (February 9, 2026)

Another Developer Rides Roughshod Over a Quiet Residential Framingham Neighborhood (September 25, 2025)

Here are video clips in which the 3 voting ZBA members explain their thinking:

• Framingham ZBA Chair Meltzer Gives His Take on the Salem End Case: Not Dover Amendment Protected

• Framingham ZBA Member Kristina Johnson Denies Dover Amendment Approval on Salem End Rd Property

• Framingham ZBA Member Lap Yan Denies Dover Amendment Approval on Salem End Rd Property

Aftermath

The extensive environmental destruction to this property remains unmitigated, and one hopes that in future, any developer who behaves in such a manner will receive painful admonishment in terms of fines and required remediation, and that contractors who cut down trees and backhoe the earth without getting permission will be banned from operating in Framingham for a significant period.

The Framingham City Council should sharpen its ordinances to ensure that fines are not waived, and that delinquent developers and contractors will suffer greatly for environmental destruction.

It is also time for the Framingham City Council to develop and approve a substantial Tree Ordinance to afford Framingham the same level of environmental protection which is commonplace in other communities.

Some thought might also be given as to why the Building Commissioner has the power to approve Dover Amendment applications, when the resources and ability required to properly make such a determination clearly lie outside the boundaries of his operating domain.

In this case, the ‘lease’ between the developer and NECC, which was pivotal to the proof of a Dover Amendment relationship, was never reviewed by the Commissioner, and indeed was never properly disclosed to the ZBA.

The developer and NECC danced around this issue, only disclosing 20% of the ‘lease’, on demand from the ZBA. This behavior, especially, created the impression that something really weird was going on here.

It should also not be forgotten that a neighborhood group was responsible for the effort to beat back the developer and NECC. They spent many months involved in this effort and hired a very capable attorney, Neal Glick of Coren Lichtenstein LLP in Wellesley, who argued the case extremely well.

Around $10,000 was raised by the neighborhood group to support this effort, and no neighborhood should have to bear that burden.

Again, the City Council should take note, and consider what can be done to protect neighborhoods from attacks by deep-pocketed developers.

A final thought revisits the strange role NECC played in this whole affair.

One of their arguments was that they needed to expand their residential housing through the development on Salem End Rd to attract staff, as they were asserting hiring difficulties in that area, and that new waterfront housing would be an attractive benefit.

A few years ago, there was a broad problem with staff shortages in out-of-district special education schools such as NECC. The state responded around 2022, by allowing those schools to raise their tuition rates, and NECC got more money for staffing, so they already got state assistance in this area.

Further, an examination of NECC 990 tax filings is very instructive:

https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/42708762

They show that in the last 10 years, NECC accumulated surpluses totaling $37.7 million, and its net asset position rose from $44.3 million to $79.3 million, so it seems to have a very strong balance sheet, with an accumulation of more than $30 million in additional cash in ten years.

The obvious question is why that enormous amount of cash wasn’t used to greater advantage to raise staff salaries, and solve the problem they claimed to have.

That is another of the mysteries surrounding NECC in the Salem End Rd affair.