Board weighs updating the master plan and proposes modest budget allocation
Get AI-powered insights, summaries, and transcripts
Subscribe
Summary
Members discussed revising the town master plan (current materials trace to 2006), potential scope of work and pledged to include a modest budget line (approx. $10,000) in the operating budget to hire help and move the plan to town review.
The planning board reviewed the town’s master-plan materials and agreed the document needs updating; members noted core maps and some text date from 2006 and that an earlier 2018 survey has limited coverage. Speaker 5 offered to champion the update and said regional planning resources could provide demographic and mapping data. Speaker 1 proposed budgeting roughly $10,000 in operating funds to support consultant work or targeted professional assistance to complete the revision.
Board members discussed breaking the update into manageable pieces (maps, implementation charts, historic resources handled by the historic commission, conservation sections by the conservation commission) and using public events to solicit input. Speakers noted the master-plan ‘implementation’ appendix included an action spreadsheet the board can reuse to prioritize short-, mid- and long-term items.
No formal appropriation was recorded in the excerpt; members agreed to put a line in the operating budget for consideration at the next fiscal cycle and to continue work at upcoming meetings.