Steering Committee, Subcommittees Gain Momentum in Shaping Westwood's Future

It may not seem like it in the forefront, but behind the scenes, several town officials are currently working hard to shape the future of Westwood.

Sparked by a “” that kicked off in October, a handful of subsequent meetings have been held to discuss ways to update the town’s Comprehensive Master Plan, which was adopted in 2000.

So far, two of those meetings have revolved around housing issues in town, and . A was later held to delve deeper into the housing issue, as well as to hold an introduction of the newly-assembled Westwood Comprehensive Plan Steering Committee and its six subcommittees that were formed based on six specific categories:

• Housing (to see members, click here)
• Community Services, Facilities and Recreation (to see members, click here)
• Community Character (to see members, click here)
• Open Space, Natural and Historical Resources (to see members, click here)
• Transportation (to see members, click here)
• Economic Development (to see members, click here)

Last week, the housing subcommittee held its first individualized meeting.

“The housing group was one we started first, because they have been interested in, for a year or so, in presenting some articles to Town Meeting,” said Westwood Planning Board Secretary Jack Wiggin.

The basis of the meeting, Wiggin said, was to review the current Comprehensive Master Plan and continue to suggest ways that it should be updated, specifically in the area of housing.

(Each subcommittee will address issues in the Comprehensive Plan related to their respective topics, before reporting their findings and recommendations to the Steering Committee. The Steering Committee itself comprises members from each of the subcommittees.)

The second goal of last week's meeting was to engage in some short-term work related to the updating process, but also to address three articles that will be brought before Town Meeting on May 2:

• Open Space Residential Development (OSRD): This refers to modern type of cluster development to save open space. It provides a way to preserve the natural topography in Westwood.
• Senior Residential Development (SRD): This revolves around how senior housing complexes should be and how to create more housing complexes down the road. SRD has been on the books for years. A number of big proposals had been addressed in the past, Wiggin said, but they were eventually appealed.
• Flexible Mixed Use Overlay Districts: This would create a zoning overlay in the University Avenue Business District, Southwest Park, and the Glacier/Everett Business District, and provide a great deal of flexibility in terms of what would be allowed to be developed in those areas.

The first two articles have been addressed at length, and the Housing Subcommittee has so far endorsed the idea of looking at townhouses in regards to OSRD, Wiggin said. As for SRD, the Housing Subcommittee has endorsed the idea of allowing it to be “as of right,” meaning that as long as development would comply with applicable zoning regulations in Westwood, developers would not need to seek discretionary action by the Planning Board.

The third article would help take the pressure off in terms of needing to tweak other zoning districts, according to Wiggin.

“This would be pretty open in terms of dimensional requirements,” Wiggin said of the Flexible Mixed Use Overlay article. “But the relevance for housing, that article says one-third of the square footage could be residential. That housing would likely be multi-family housing, and that would take care of diversity of housing types (in town), adding condos and apartments. You wouldn’t have to think about putting it elsewhere.”

Tomorrow night, the Community Services, Facilities & Recreation Subcommittee will meet with the Planning Board. Each subsequent subcommittee will then meet, on average, every couple of months Wiggin said. The entire updating process will take approximately up to 18 months.

The Community Character Subcommittee is tentatively scheduled to meet on March 10, and items discussed by the Economiv Development Subcommittee will be discussed as part of the agenda of an upcoming meeting of the Westwood Economic Advisory Board.

It has yet to be determined with the Transportation Subcommittee and Open Space, Natural and Historical Resources Subcommittee will meet, as the town is still recruiting members for those respective boards.

To learn more about Westwood's Comprehensive Master Plan Updating process, click here.