Updated on Tuesday evening to correct a reference to the Sweetwood development on Cold Spring Road.

 

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — After months of consternation over the cost of overruns to a multi-modal path through town, the town manager Monday announced that Williamstown's share of the cost has effectively been cut in half.

 

"MassDOT has said that what they'd be willing to do is accept the $700,000 we've paid as the sum total due to them for all the overruns," Robert Menicocci told the Select Board on Monday night.

 

"Right now, the additional overrun is approaching $700,000. We're off the hook for that amount of money."

 

Menicocci thanked the state Department of Transportation's regional office for its support in the town's negotiations with the state agency as well as the support of state Rep. John Barrett III and state Sen. Paul Mark.

 

All five of the Select Board members also paid their thanks to Menicocci, noting that it was a "big win" for the town.

 

"And I think it's right to thank John Barrett and Senator Mark," Chair Hugh Daley said. "It's good to have those guys in our corner."

 

Most of the meeting was consumed with discussion of next month's annual town meeting — both nailing down some of the logistical issues the board has been toying with to make the gathering more accessible and going through the 41-article warrant item by item to make advisory votes to the meeting.

 

Actually, the town meeting warrant could have 42 articles after an 11th-hour discussion by the board on Monday.

 

The board learned earlier this year that a home rule petition approved by town meeting last spring to increase the number of alcohol sales licenses in town failed. Barrett advised the board last month that the reason was that Boston officials said such requests should have either a specific potential licensee or a specific economic development district attached.

 

On Monday, Randal Fippinger suggested to his colleagues that they should bring back last year's article, overwhelmingly passed by town meeting, with language specifying that it is intended to address a known applicant who has been unable to obtain a license in town because its allotted licenses are under use.

 

The board agreed, but it was not clear at Monday's meeting whether that would require a new town meeting vote or whether the town could otherwise put the question to the Legislature — like through an ask from the Select Board. Menicocci told the board he would consult with town counsel to see whether new town meeting action is needed and, if so, how such an article should be worded, in time to get it back before the Select Board for final approval before the warrant goes to the printer.

 

Otherwise, the 41 articles are set. Most, but not all, received unanimous recommendations from the five-member board.

 

One of the zoning bylaw amendments developed by the Planning Board was recommended by just a 4-1 vote on Monday. Daley, who joined a unanimous vote to recommend passage of an amendment to allow three-family homes by right in the General Residence district, voted against recommending a companion article to allow four-family homes.

 

"I want to pause after going to three and see what happens," Daley said.

 

That was why the planners, who agree that four-family homes by right is the way to go, opted split the recommendation into two separate articles, assuming that some number of town residents could share Daley's more cautious approach. The Planning Board agreed that they would rather see the "triplex" bylaw pass and a four-family home bylaw fail rather than up the allowable by-right housing in GR directly from two-family homes to four-family homes in one step.

 

All of the Select Board's Monday votes on the zoning bylaw amendments drafted by the Planning Board were conditional. The Select Board agreed that they were voting based on the articles' current language, but that could, theoretically, change at the Planning Board's Tuesday 7 p.m. public hearing on all the bylaw amendments.

 

The Select Board was disinclined to make an advisory vote on a separate pair zoning bylaw amendments that were drafted by the owner of the Sweetwood assisted independent-living complex on Cold Spring Road. The complex's owner is asking that the town extend the Southern Gateway zoning district to include Sweetwood and, in a separate article brought by landowner petition, amend the Southern Gateway use table to allow conversion of existing buildings to multifamily dwellings by right.

 

Sweetwood's representative this winter told the Select Board that it wants to be able to convert some of the property's units to regular apartments due to a lack of demand for independent-living residences and high vacancy rates at the site.

 

The Sweetwood bylaw amendments also will be included in Tuesday's Planning Board public hearing. The Select Board members agreed that they did not have enough information to make a recommendation on the proposals one way or the other.

 

The board also agreed, 5-0, that town meeting should reject a citizen's petition to require "ranked choice voting" in town elections. Andrew Hogeland said that while some might be inclined to support the idea of ranked-choice voting, there was not enough time to fully vet a more than two-page article that, in his reading, deviates from a ranked-choice voting proposal that failed statewide in 2020 but was supported by Williamstown voters, 64.5 percent to 35.5 percent.

 

The majority of the Select Board also agreed that the time is not ripe for another article brought by citizens petition. Article 32 on the meeting warrant would change the town's leash bylaw to require dogs to be kept on leash in the General Residence district when not on an owner's property and on the new multi-modal pike/pedestrian path.

 

In a 4-1 vote, the Select Board agreed that while the issue has merit, it should be studied by a town committee and brought back for town meeting 2024. Fippinger, who drafted the leash law article, said he would continue to press the issue at this year's town meeting, with some amendments suggested by the conversation at Monday's meeting.

 

The board voted to recommend town meeting approve all the Community Preservation Act allocations that issued from the Community Preservation Committee's meetings this winter. But three of those votes were not unanimous.

 

Daley and Jane Patton voted against passage of a $120,000 grant to the town's Affordable Housing Trust. Hogeland voted against recommending a $100,000 award to the Mount Greylock Regional School District to pay for a new track, arguing that Williamstown should not approve the CPA outlay without the district having asked its other member town, Lanesborough, for a like contribution to the project. Daley and Hogeland voted against $50,000 for the Williamstown Meetinghouse Preservation Fund based on concerns over the separation of church and state.

 

All five Select Board members supported a separate article concerning the Mount Greylock track and field project. The vote was 5-0 to recommend town meeting vote to authorize the regional school district to borrow up to $800,000 to pay for the track project. But Jeffrey Johnson noted that he wished the school district also had asked its member towns to financially support a budget that included a position for a districtwide director of diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging.