Town of Otis
Planning Board Meeting Minutes August 14, 2023
Call to order 7:00 PM
1. Roll Call:
Mark Anthony – Chair
Terry Cook-Visser
Rona Knight
Barb Gallagher
Hal Kobrin
2. Approval of June 12, 2023 minutes
Rona motion to accept, Terry second, all in favor.
3. Form A: 172/238 West Center Rd
Terry motion to approve, Hal second, all in favor.
4. D&J modification to special permit
-David Donahue and Mark Amanti: Update, Mark now equity partner,
Taken down buildings and removed asbestos materials, landscaping, installed well and worked with MA DEEP and well has been approved for public water system, been difficult getting project off the ground with high building costs and difficulty for building costs, project being done in phases in, banks and cost and not getting funds for this.., wanting to do restoration of an existing building as opposed to a entirely new building
In place off building 6 on the plans proposing to restore existing building,
Original plan for 9 townhouse style condos, each building 5 unit building,
Building 6
Existing well there, just need testing, existing parking street side, would like to modify parking in rear to 16 spots, put in a new septic system, small for this building instead of immediately doing the large system needed for the entire project,
Existing building has good structure,
Proposing 3 units on main floor, two end units 3 bdrm, center unit 2 bdrm, add decking on sides and front,
Second floor, 4 units, all 2 bdrm,
Originally proposed building 6, 5 units
Comment from Hal, 7 units instead of 5, changes a lot of requirements such as parking and septic and such, much of this needs to be approved before coming to us, asking for something we are unable to approve at this meeting, other departments need to approve first, Zoning, building dept, conservation, board of health, exc,
Building permits require all departments to sign off, and comment, need other committees to approve before planning board is able to approve,
This modification fundamentally changes the entire plan as it has been previously approved.
Need to show this change does not impact/effect the rest of the plans that have already been approved
Spoke with Larry Gould, he said first step was to go to the Planning Board and the zoning board didn’t need to approve it…
No change to grade, no change to roads, …
Concept is good with the board we just need the other boards and depts approvals first, need all the information that shows/proves everything is good to go and that the change does not impact any other aspects of the existing approved plans before planning board can approve it
5. Any other business old or new.
-state has grants for small towns, two grants, Otis looking to get a new library, have land next to town hall, but now may want a new police station there instead of library,
Building use and reuse a part of master plan, master plan should be updated every 5-10 years, our master plan is 7 years old, need to keep master plan up to date in order to get funding, planning boards responsibility to bring building use interest to the public, we need to redo/update the master plan,
-suggesting to update master plan, the board should be asking for the budget to update masster plan
-contact BRPC to ask what it would be to update our plan, cost, requirements, exc,
-we have 2 years before it has to be done, doing it early was rejected by selectboard, so yes we should start to think about it and how much it would cost, we can start now cuz it takes two years to update the master plan and we need to have an updated plan at 10 years so in about two years,
6. Hal motion to adjourn 8:13 PM. Terry Second. All in favor.