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Foxborough planner outlines World Cup preparations, pending zoning articles and grant work
Summary
Town planner Catherine told the Planning Board the office will run on a skeleton crew during World Cup events, staff are awaiting grants for affordable-housing work, and the town plans to advance solar/battery language and study data-center zoning later in the year.
Catherine, the town planner, told the Planning Board on May 14 that most grant projects remain pending and two grant applications are still awaiting decisions. She said staff recently completed an affordable-housing inventory and are preparing a business sign façade program expected to launch next month.
"Most of our grant projects, we're still kind of in limbo, waiting on whether or not we're going to receive funds on two of them," Catherine said during the planner update, adding that work on an R-15 district review grant remains incomplete.
The planner said the office will be on a skeleton crew during World Cup events to avoid traffic impacts but will continue to run marketing efforts aimed at drawing visitors to local businesses through a Visit FPW partnership. "Our office is going to be staffed and open during all the World Cup events, but we'll be on a skeleton crew," she said, urging residents to contact staff by email or before game start times for nonurgent matters.
Catherine said town staff are preparing zoning language for solar and battery energy-storage to be proposed at the next town meeting, and that the town is "learning a lot" about data centers and intends to target a data-center article for a fall special town meeting. She also told the board that the failed Napanset town-meeting article will delay work on an age-restricted housing article until a less busy season.
Why it matters: the planner's report ties near-term land-use work (solar/battery, potential data-center zoning, and housing overlays) to larger operational and outreach priorities, and signals constrained staffing and timing around high-traffic events this summer. The office's decisions about when to advance complex zoning proposals will affect public engagement schedules and subsequent hearings.
Looking ahead: Catherine said staff will continue to refine language and community-engagement plans for the more technical overlay and housing items and will pursue the grants that could fund review work.
