DEERFIELD – All 12 articles were approved as read or amended at Special Town Meeting Monday evening, including a contentious one that sought to reduce frontage requirements in certain districts in town.
Article 8 — which is a revision of a bylaw revision shot down at Annual Town Meeting in June — sought to reduce the minimum frontage specifically in the Center Village Residential District, Small-Business District and Industrial District to 50 feet. The original bylaw in June proposed a minimum frontage of 50 feet across the entire town of Deerfield.
Select Board member Carolyn Shores Ness explained that the town has two projects in mind that would benefit from this bylaw change: developing the Leary Lot for parking and access to Elm Street, and the proposed North Main Street park.
“We would like the support of the town on this,” she said.
Representatives from the Deerfield Planning Board and Finance Committee spoke to say their respective boards were in support of the proposed change.
Resident Lili Dwight urged fellow voters to vote in favor of the proposed bylaw change.
“This bylaw is the first step toward village-focused development that is anti-sprawl and preserves farmland,” she said. “It brings added vitality to the village center that extends all the way up to Mill Village Road and down (Route) 116.”
Dwight said the bylaw would give the town the ability to develop small clusters in Center Village, “keep older adults integrated … and it locates … us in walking distance of town, medical, recreational and business services.”
Speaking specifically to the North Main Street park project, she said it’s no longer a question of “if” but a question of “how?”
“It is a community asset, owned by all of us for all of us,” Dwight said.
Resident Jennifer Remillard, a member of the Zoning Board of Appeals, also spoke in favor of the bylaw change. She objected to statements made that the public is unaware which properties are town-owned and where they are located, as they can all be located on the assessors’ map.
“In research done regarding other community frontages, it’s been an average of 20 feet for access — not just for municipality properties, but in general,” she added. “That’s a bylaw proposal that can be brought up at a future hearing, so if you’re interested in having more than just municipalities being brought up, I think that’s a great idea.”
In the meantime, the bylaw change allows the town the ability to move forward with the North Main Street project, for example, “in a way everyone agrees on,” she said.
Others who voted in support of the bylaw change spoke to the need for a park in Deerfield, as the closest park for many residents is located in Sunderland.
Others, still, had questions about the long-term implications of the change, and about the way supporters characterized the change.
“This will result in a wholesale re-development of a wooded area, removing all wildlife, birds and plants,” said Judith Rathbone, who owns one of the properties next to the North Main Street park.
She said the proposed zoning change would be unfair to residents who may want to develop their property, as the frontage change only applies to town-owned properties.
“This proposed zoning change is a really radical departure for Deerfield, with the town government wanting to be exempt and put themselves above the people,” Rathbone said.
After a failed motion to move the question and a lengthy discussion that followed, the article was ultimately approved by a two-thirds majority vote.
Also approved on Monday night were two articles that sought to approve a new tourism zoning district that would encompass the Routes 5 and 10 corridor and South Deerfield.
“This overlay district allows the breweries to do some activities by right — tours, tasting, classes, etc. — and go to Planning Board for a special permit on other issues,” Shores Ness said.
Some residents asked whether this change constituted spot zoning, or was benefiting certain businesses over others.
“The idea was to incorporate all three of the breweries in town, and to not incorporate any residential areas,” Shores Ness said. “The Leary Lot … is included because we wanted to include Berkshire Brewing. The development of the Leary Lot will be to alleviate parking in the neighborhoods around there and to encourage good activity.”
Select Board member Trevor McDaniel added that the idea behind the district was to “test run” the concept of this type of district.
“It’s important to see how this works out,” he said.
The article passed with a two-thirds majority.
Residents also had a brief discussion on Article 12, a revision to the solar bylaw passed at June’s Annual Town Meeting. The revision sought to restrict by-right, ground-mounted solar arrays to 660 square feet.
Resident Mark Brennan, a member of the Capital Improvements Planning Committee, however, proposed an amendment to the bylaw, which would restrict by-right, small-scale ground-mounted solar arrays to 1,000 square feet rather than 660 feet.
“I’m a big fan of green energy and would like to see our residents who might live in buildings that may not be optimized for solar … be able to do this,” he said.
The amendment was supported, and the article — as amended — was approved.
Other articles that were approved Monday night pertained to unanticipated expenses from previous years.