The Davis Square Neighborhood Council hosted a co-learning session in the Joyce Cummings Center on Monday for community members to educate each other on the inner workings of development and zoning in Davis Square and the leverage residents have over such changes.
Zoë Fahy, a master’s student in urban planning, began the meeting by explaining the purpose of the co-learning session.
“The main reason we’re here is I think it would be really great in general if more people knew about zoning,” Fahy explained. “I think zoning and developing an understanding of how neighborhoods get shaped puts residents in a totally different position, right? It’s very empowering to know how things work.”
Before explaining the process behind individual development projects, Fahy broadened the scope to discuss existing long-term plans for Davis Square. There are currently two city-created master plans for Davis Square: SomerVision 2040 and the Davis Square Commercial Area Plan, which focuses solely on Davis Square.
The Davis Square Commercial Area Plan lays out three primary goals: increasing accessibility and mobility on streets, updating traffic and pedestrian safety and improving public spaces.
Fahy noted that progress on the plan lacks clarity. She recalled struggling to find a reliable way to determine its status online.
“There’s an opaqueness sometimes with these planning documents where it’s articulating, ‘This is a policy goal,’ or, ‘We need to make things safer,’ but it’s really unclear,” Fahy said.
The council is applying to become a fully formed nonprofit organization, which would allow it more leverage at the negotiating table.
“The City of Somerville has an ordinance that allows neighborhood councils to exist as democratically elected representative organizations in the city,” Elaine, the president of the council, explained. “We can create bylaws, file them with the City Council, and if the City Council approves [them], we get the ability to negotiate community benefits agreements with development happening in our geographic area.”
During the meeting, attendees asked clarifying questions and expressed concerns regarding development and the council’s potential role in negotiations.
David Booth, a Somerville resident, raised concerns about whether having the neighborhood council negotiate with developers would only lengthen negotiations that only larger developers could afford.
“It seems like it would probably disadvantage smaller developers that don’t have the resources to negotiate for like 12 to 18 months with the neighborhood council,” Booth said.
A representative from the Union Square Neighborhood Council explained that smaller developers are not automatically at a disadvantage.
“Often developers will tell you, ‘Oh, it took us 18 months or two years; the [USNC] forced us to do this and everything.’ A lot of times it’s actually the other way around. We want to move, and they don’t want to,” she said.
She explained that larger projects may actually face more challenges because they require greater amendments to zoning in order to proceed.
“The bigger the project, the more they need in terms of the change in zoning — the more power you have as a council, as a community,” she said.
After Fahy explained the life cycle of a development project and the importance of residents getting involved as early as possible, a resident named Sue expressed confusion about how to track a project’s current stage.
“How is it that the broader community learns about the pre-application phase, and then how does the broader community then stay apprised of where a development review is along this continuum?” she asked.
Fahy and members of the audience provided three answers: attend DSNC meetings and sign up for its newsletters, review the city calendar on the Somerville government website and subscribe to city officials’ newsletters, which review ongoing projects in Somerville.
The audience then split into small groups to discuss particular concerns about points raised in the meeting as well as hopes for future development, before reconvening to share their ideas.
The Burren is slated to close for the duration of construction on the 500-unit Copper Mill development on Elm Street. This remains a point of concern for residents and has been raised in Davis Square Neighborhood Council meetings in the months since the project’s proposal.
To address a lack of transparency in development projects such as Copper Mill, one group suggested setting up bulletin boards outside the project site so residents could view proposed plans and participate in the public comment process.
“The building with the Burren in it should have a big spread that shows this is what’s planned,” one attendee said. “This is when the next board meeting is for the Davis Square Council; this is when the next zoning meeting is; this is the city councilor you’d contact; this is the board email address to contact.”
