Rochester’s Planning Board Tuesday voted to recommend the five zoning bylaw amendments proposed for the May 13 Annual Town Meeting after a public hearing and some minor tweaking of their language.
The board approved “as written” a bylaw language change mandating that the location of any site with any historical significance must be identified to avoid “mitigating impacts” to such sites during development of that location. When the project development requires altering the soil, a qualified observer must be present to ensure that historical resources are not disturbed.
The board also endorsed four other bylaw language changes. One would require that a proposed back lot in the Agricultural-Residential District be owned by the applicant for at least five years prior to an application to develop it. Another would mandate that lot access shall only being allowed through or across a viable, legal road frontage. The third amendment would hold that the required rectangular shape of a lot will no longer need to be within the 40-foot setback line.
Planning Board Chairman Arnold Johnson said the back-lot amendment corrects a loophole that Town Counsel pointed out needs to be fixed. “The language didn’t say specifically what we thought it said,” Johnson said. “Now it’s specific.”
Regarding the lot-shape amendment, he said, “We are just formalizing what we’ve already been doing.”
The fourth amendment the board endorsed would clarify that the town’s ground-mounted solar photovoltaic overlay district is better defined as being town-owned land on High Street, not to include a privately owned parcel also at 0 High Street.
The board, however, took more time before endorsing a new bylaw adopting regulations for the construction and permitting of battery-energy storage systems, which are used mainly by solar-energy-array facilities. A small, residential, battery storage system, what board members called a tier-one system, would be exempt. But board members agreed that all other installations, tiers two and three, shall need a special permit and a site-plan review from the Planning Board. They also agreed that no such energy storage system may be permitted in a groundwater-protection district or inside the Mattapoisett River Valley Water District.
In other action, the Planning Board endorsed Approval Not Required applications for two newly proposed house lots at 0 Bishop Road filed by Marc T. Wilson, whose legal representative explained his client is creating two, new Form-A lots out of the property, both the required frontage and upland, and will be selling off one of the lots.
The board reviewed its draft decision approving JPF Development LLC’s plan to construct a 15-acre, self-storage facility with seven storage buildings and a total of 300 units within the Industrial District at Kings Highway and Route 28. Johnson said the board will formally sign the decision at its next meeting.
The Rochester Planning Board will participate in the town’s Interdepartmental meeting to be held on Wednesday, May 1, at 6:00 pm at the Rochester Senior Center on Dexter Lane.
Rochester Planning Board
By Michael J. DeCicco