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The Sudbury Housing Authority (SHA) was before the Community Preservation Committee (CPC) on Wednesday, December 18. They were looking for the committee to support funding for a portion of a project that would convert four of the SHA’s existing single-family homes into duplexes. As is standard process for the CPC, the meeting was a public hearing for the applicant to present, for committee members to ask questions, and for the public to provide comment.
The presentation from the SHA recapped a lot of information that was already made public by the SHA. The ensuing discussion with the committee focused primarily on the financials and alternatives to the project. There was much discussion about other options the SHA might have for creating affordable units – including building duplexes at other locations around Sudbury. Yet other questions dug into why the SHA wouldn’t just renovate the existing single-family homes for less money.
The response to that line of thinking was three-fold. First, the quote they had received to renovate one of the units so that it could be rented was really for the bare-minimum to make it habitable. In addition, by demolishing the single-family units and building duplexes, the SHA would qualify for state funding and ongoing vouchers that they couldn’t get if they just fixed up the single-family homes. They also added that there has been increasing demand for smaller units. Much of discussion covered ground that was already covered in an FAQ published by the SHA in October.
While the SHA has explored other development opportunities in recent years, including on Nobscot Road and at Frost Farm, some members of the committee and the public appeared to feel that the SHA had not explored all possibilities.
To that point – a significant number of residents from the Pine Lakes neighborhood had joined the meeting to provide public comment. Comments consistently voiced support for the mission of the Sudbury Housing Authority, but strong opposition to this specific project. Commenters questioned the appropriateness of the project for the neighborhood, raised their governance concerns with the SHA, and raised their concerns about fiscal responsibility.
Some drama unfolded late in the meeting when the committee learned that a member of the public had been removed from the Zoom meeting by Town staff. However, the public commenters had also voiced dissatisfaction with the format of the public hearing. The Community Preservation Committee decided the format for the hearing during a prior open meeting. That included a three-minute limit on each public comment and a target of spending 30-minutes in total on each application.
That practice has precedent on other boards and committees in Sudbury, including most recently at the November 25 meeting of the Sudbury Public Schools School Committee. Chair Nicole Burnard announced that public comment would be limited to approximately 15 minutes total, and three minutes per speaker. Burnard concluded public comment before everyone who had signed in to comment got an opportunity to speak, because time had elapsed. (42:40)
The Community Preservation Committee opted to extend the public comment period for the SHA hearing, but only one more member of the public appeared to take the opportunity to comment by raising a virtual hand on Zoom. At the end of that comment, Vice Chair Kirsten Roopenian took a moment and asked for any other hands raised on Zoom, but apparently none were showing as raised, and that concluded the extended public comment period. The committee went back to the SHA for further comment, and continued questions and deliberation with the committee.
While the CPC isn’t showing its cards on any application before them, it is particularly hard to gauge how most members are feeling about the SHA application. Given the vocal opposition from some residents in the Pine Lakes neighborhood, the committee appears to be focused on balancing the desire for public participation and their own previously-stated desire to use a consistent format for all applications.
One twist that emerged on Wednesday was the notion of building more duplexes on other SHA properties in Sudbury that have more land than the Pine Lakes parcels. While there may be many alternatives to the current project proposal, that framing may set up a Sudbury-wide game of “duplex hot potato” between neighborhoods. In addition to recent controversy around the Housing Production Plan, there’s no shortage of housing acrimony for the CPC and the SHA to navigate.
Adjacent to all of this is a recent piece of State legislation that allows accessory dwelling units (ADU) by-right in single-family zoning districts. The Planning Board is working on a bylaw that would try to assert some local control over ADU’s, but in their latest meeting they learned that municipalities may ultimately have very limited control over them. (25:40)
While Sudbury is dominated by single-family homes, it would appear that some increase in density and housing stock diversity is becoming inevitable as the State advances legislation designed to deal with the housing crisis.
As for the CPC, they primarily focus on evaluating if an application is eligible for Community Preservation Act funding. While some residents may not like a project, that doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t qualify for funding. If the CPC recommends a project, Town Meeting still gets to vote the article up or down. The CPC will have to sort through all of that when they deliberate and take their votes next month.