Attorney urges Planning Board to move forward with Housing Redevelopment Overlay rewrite; board schedules public hearing for Aug. 5

Attorney Ethan Wood, representing Nomad & Chaney and O’Neil, presented a rewrite of Laconia’s Housing Redevelopment Overlay District and recommended the planning board forward the staff draft to public hearing.

Wood said the overlay had been adopted in the 1970s and essentially never used. The proposed rewrite would convert the overlay into a conditional use permitting regime that borrows from performance zoning and adds limits on density and height. The draft would require at least 20% of units in an affected project to be deed‑restricted workforce housing, enforce minimum dwelling sizes (400 square feet), add parking standards, require lot mergers where a project crosses multiple lots, and include dark‑sky lighting requirements.

Wood told the board he “would absolutely recommend that you approve it as staff has written it,” but said he was asking only that the board schedule the item for public hearing. Planning staff clarified the changes would not apply retroactively to existing projects and that any vote on the draft would be scheduled for a later meeting; the board agreed to set a public hearing for Aug. 5 to give the public time to review both the current ordinance language and the proposed rewrite. The board asked staff to make both the current and proposed language available via the agenda file and posted materials.