Precinct 1, 3, 5, 7 Fall Meeting - Nov 19th, 2024

Meeting held via remote participation. Materials were available from https://www.arlingtonma.gov/Home/Components/Calendar/Event/35445/.

(Len Diggins, P3 Town Meeting Member) Mr. Diggins asks if Arlington should refile its home rule petition for ranked choice voting.

(Greg Dennis, P1 TMM) Mr. Dennis says the legislature is being stubborn. Seven communities submitted home rule petitions for ranked choice voting and the legislature hasn't acted on any of them. Is it worth doing this again? Maybe, but it's not a priority right now. Mr. Dennis says that Boston may file a similar home rule petition, and they'll be harder for the legislature to ignore.

(Jennifer Litowski, P3 TMM) Ms. Litowski volunteers with Everywhere Arlington Liveable Streets and the Broadway Neighbors Coalition. There are three items she'd like to mention. The first is Water Main work happening on Broadway. Arlington received a $1M grant to do a complete streets planning study for Broadway. She's hopeful we'll be able to get short-term safety improvements after the water main work, and before the larger street redesign.

Arlington has been working with an organization called Neighborways on a traffic calming guide. The guide will include a list of traffic calming measures -- like speed humps and raised crosswalks -- along with guidelines and engineering details for their use.

Finally, the town is developing a tool to help them prioritize traffic calming requests. This might be ready in Q1 of 2025. There have also been street signage improvements in East Arlington.

(Vince Baudoin, P1 TMM) Mr. Baudoin says it's great to see people getting on board with what the Broadway Neighbors Coalition is doing. People see potential in Broadway, and safer bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure will help make it a better destination. He's concerned that Somerville's improvements will make their side of Broadway a safe street, while Arlington's turns into a drag strip.

(Len Diggins) Mr. Diggins says the funding for Broadway came from a new MPO project to help communities with design work. The goal of complete streets is to make streets accessible and friendly.

(Asia Kepka, P1 TMM) Ms. Kepka likes the idea of having safer streets. She doesn't think that signage will get people to slow down but speed bumps would be helpful. Sometimes she hears accidents on Route 16 and Broadway.

(Len Diggins) Mr. Diggins says the MPO likes to find projects that can be implemented quickly. He says that Arlington has requested the removal of the 30 MPH speed provisions on Broadway and Park Ave, so they'll revert to the town-wide speed limit of 25 MPH.

(Betty Stone, P7 TMM) Ms. Stone asks if there could be police enforcement from time to time.

(Len Diggins) Mr. Diggins offers to communicate this suggestion to the town manager. He says that one of the Select Board and Town Manager goals is to improve traffic enforcement.

(Jo Anne Preston, P5 TMM) Ms. Preston says she lives in a neighborhood full of school children. There's a crosswalk at the corner of Medford St and Webcowett Road, but no signage. She wonders if that could be looked at.

(Len Diggins) Mr. Diggins suggests reaching out to the town manager.

(Asia Kepka) Ms. Kepka says she often sees a police car parked by the cemetery or in front of the old Arlington Automatic Transmission building. She thinks that having the police parked more visibly might deter speeding. Medford has signs that tell drivers how fast they're going, and these might be helpful in Arlington.

(John Tortelli, P1 resident) Mr. Tortelli would like to talk about Combined Sewer Overflows (CSOs) in the Alewife Brook. He thinks that Cambridge should be required to put in some sort of retention tank.

(Kristin Anderson, P11 TMM) Ms. Anderson says that Save the Alewife Brook is having a community meeting on December 8th, and they'll be able to share some information from MassDEP. She says that MassDEP is going to require mitigating measures from Cambridge, Somerville, and the MWRA. This will include live notifications of CSO releases and odor control. Ms. Anderson says the MBTA is planning to reconstruct the Alewife T station garage; there's a large sewer main that runs underneath the site, and the reconstruction might provide an opportunity for improvement. After a large rainstorm, untreated water flows into the Alewife Brook and onto the greenway. Cambridge says they're planning to invest more in a long term control program.

(John Tortelli) Mr. Tortelli thinks that Arlington's political people should put more pressure on Cambridge and Somerville.

(Kristin Anderson) Ms. Anderson says that Cambridge, Somerville, and the MWRA have to do cost estimates for improvements, but planning takes a long time.

(Susan Stamps, P3 TMM) Ms. Stamps says she just came from a Sustainable Arlington meeting, where representatives Sean Garballey and Dave Rodgers talked to the group about the state's climate bill. She wonders why Arlington hasn't sued the MWRA, Cambridge, and Somerville. She'd like to hear more about the Affordable Housing Overlay (AHO) proposal that's being worked on.

(Steve Revilak, P1 TMM) Mr. Revilak says the AHO proposal is a citizen initiative that came out of the MBTA Communities effort. There was criticism that MBTA Communities didn't do much to address affordable housing -- that wasn't the goal of the legislation -- and a group of residents wanted to do something responsive to affordable housing needs. Three members of the group have day jobs that involve funding affordable housing: Karen Kelleher, Beth Elliot, and HCA director Erica Schwarz. The other members are Sanjay Newton and Carol Kowalski.

State and federal subsidies like Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) are the most effective way to fund affordable housing, and there are conditions on the types of projects that are eligible for these funds. One typically needs an apartment with 30 or 40 units to qualify, so part of the work was figuring out how to zone for apartment buildings of that size.

The current proposal follows the form-based approach that Arlington took for MBTA Communities. Setbacks would remain the same but the overlay would allow an additional two stories. Regulations like floor area ratio, usable open space, and lot area per dwelling unit wouldn't apply. We'd also propose a parking requirement of 0.5 spaces per dwelling. The overlay would apply town-wide, but mixed-use would be a requirement in the Central and Village Business districts.

In terms of affordability, we'd propose that 70% of dwellings be restricted to households making 60% of the area median income, which is compatible with LIHTC. LIHTC also requires that 13% of units be set aside for households making 30% of the area median income. Up to 30% of the units could be market rate in order to allow for income mixing. There were two motivations for this: having some market rate rents helps to subsidize the more deeply affordable ones, and we wanted to avoid the stigma that can be associated with low income housing.

Mr. Revilak says this will proceed like any other citizen warrant article. When the warrant opens, we'll have to go out and get signatures, and the article would go to the Redevelopment Board and town meeting.

(Rebecca Persson, P1 TMM) Ms. Persson thinks the parking minimum of 0.5 spaces per dwelling is too low, and suggests the proposal include something higher.

(Steve Revilak) Mr. Revilak says that 0.5 spaces per dwelling is in line with the parking utilization at the Housing Corporation of Arlington's apartment properties. Higher parking minimums increase costs and leave less room for housing. The idea is to let builders provide the amount of parking they think they'll need.

(Jo Anne Preston) Ms. Preston wants to talk about parking. She says that parking is the biggest need for people who live in affordable housing. Low income people have different jobs. They're bakery workers that have to show up at 3am or cleaners that have to drive from house to house. She says that people who need housing the most are also the people who need parking the most. Seniors need parking too. She hopes people realize that people in low income housing have different needs. She doesn't understand where the Housing Corporation of Arlington gets their parking numbers from.

Ms. Preston says we need low income housing for families and that the housing authority takes people from homeless shelters. She says low income people need parking, and it's hard for disabled people to take the bus. She also thinks there should be a sufficient number of affordable units.

Ms. Preston says that building affordable apartments could displace people living in houses, and the town doesn't have a relocation policy. Ms. Preston say she's studied mixed-income housing and that it's not ideal to have people with different incomes living close together. She says you can't provide services if there are too few low-income people, and that not everyone can ride a bike or take the 77 bus.

(Asia Kepka) Ms. Kepka says she's always been struck by the difference between transportation in Poland and the US. She asks what's being done to improve transportation. Maybe something like an express bus. Ms. Kepka says it seems like we're stuck around existing transportation.

(Len Diggins) Mr. Diggins understands the desire for transportation improvements, but Arlington would be getting into a very long line. The state is still looking at ways to fund public transit.

(Sean Garballey, State Representative) Mr. Garballey says that people do line up and ask for better T service, and he was concerned about the elimination of the 79 bus. This year, Massachusetts invested $300M from the millionaires tax to the MBTA, and he expects the FY 2025--2026 budget to have even more money for public transportation. This would fund both the MBTA and regional transit authorities. He's advocating for the legislature to fund the T adequately.

(Andy Greenspon, P5 TMM) Mr. Greenspon says we have a housing crisis at all income levels, and we'll get nothing if we let the perfect be the enemy of the good. In order to have more affordable units, we'll need to allow larger buildings. Regarding the disabled, Mr. Greenspon says that not everyone with a disability can drive. One of his relatives can't drive because of blindness. He says that the elderly have to drive because society forces them to. He says that parking minimums are just minimums, and developers will build what they think they need.

Mr. Greenspon also wants to mention the Arlington Heights rezoning, because that's likely to come to town meeting in the spring.

There's a bit more light conversation, and the meeting ends.